According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), a Congolese woman was released thousands of miles away from her seven-year-old daughter by the ICE on Tuesday. The asylum seeker was held at a detention center in Otay Mesa, San Diego for four months. Meanwhile, her daughter was detained alone in a facility in Chicago.
The ACLU sued the Trump administration on behalf of the woman and her daughter. The organization claimed that there was no reason to separate them and accused the White House of violating their clients’ constitutional rights. The ACLU thus demanded that mother and daughter be reunited. Immigration officials half-heeded the organization’s request: They released the mother, but her daughter is still in custody in Chicago. As The Washington Post reports, the two have yet to be reunited.
The lawsuit caused quite the stir. The incident showcased the harsher realities of the present administration’s stance on immigration. As the ACLU noted in their lawsuit, previous administrations never forcibly separated families like the Trump White House has. Under President Obama, women were detained with their children for no longer than 21 days. Makes you wonder how the right can call themselves pro-family.
While the White House has no formal policy on separating women and children, the deputy director of the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project, Judy Rabinovitz, told The Washington Post, "We know that they’re in fact doing it, and that they need to stop."
Tyler Q. Houlton, a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services (DHS), defended the ICE in a statement saying that immigration officials have the right to separate mothers and children "to protect a child from potential smuggling and trafficking activities."
