Trump administration backtracks on defunding legal help for migrant children
The Trump administration's decision to rip federal funding away from organizations that provide free legal services to migrant children has been reversed, after igniting chaos among immigrant aid groups who feared tens of thousands of children would be left without attorneys.
Less than a week ago, the U.S. Departments of the Interior and Health and Human Services issued a stop work order to dozens of legal aid groups across the country that provide pro bono representation to migrant children, cutting them off from funding provided under the Unaccompanied Children Program.
On Friday, that stop work order was revoked, without explanation. Neither of the two federal agencies has commented on the reversal.
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Advocates warned the result of the stop work order would be tens of thousands of children who arrive in the U.S. without their parents or legal guardians being forced to face judges alone to plead their case, without the help of an expert to refute the arguments of federal attorneys calling for their removal from the country. That would virtually guarantee deportation, as the vast majority of unaccompanied minors — some of them just two years old — don't speak English and aren't prepared to navigate the country's complex immigration court system.
The Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project, Arizona's largest provider of legal resources for immigrants, was one of several legal aid groups that grappled with the prospect of ending services once existing funds ran out.
In the past four months alone, 4,073 children have crossed the Arizona-Mexico border, many seeking asylum after fleeing violence in their home countries. Lillian Aponte, the Project's executive director, said during a Wednesday news conference that it currently has more than 800 legal cases open, and that the thousands of know your rights presentations and case consultations it conducts on an annual basis were jeopardized by the stop work order.
Roxana Avila-Cimpeanu, the organization's deputy director, welcomed the news of the restored funding as 'unequivocally good,' but said they are wary of future attacks on immigrant rights from the Trump administration. She added that even just a days-long funding freeze has consequences for unaccompanied children who need legal help.
'We are clear-eyed that this is not the last threat to funding for legal services for detained immigrant children, and we will remain vigilant in protecting the rights of immigrant children here in Arizona,' Avila-Cimpeanu said in a written statement. 'The uncertainty of these unanticipated stop work orders and then the subsequent rapid rescissions is quite harmful to the people who are impacted by them and the organizations who provide these services. It is critical for legal services to be available to immigrant children without interruption and for organizations to be able to rely on the funding provided by these contracts.'
Before the stop work order was rescinded, immigrant legal aid groups, including the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, which has advocated on behalf of immigrants for more than two decades and provides services in multiple states, had been weighing the possibility of challenging it in court.
The Amica Center headed a lawsuit against a similar stop work order issued in January by the Trump administration, which halted funding for four federal programs intended to help immigrants, including the Legal Orientation Program, the Immigration Court Helpdesk, the Family Group Legal Orientation Program and the Counsel for Children Initiative. That order was also ultimately walked back less than two weeks after being issued — and just two days after the lawsuit was filed. No explanation for that reversal was given, either.
Part of the Amica Center's January lawsuit argued that the Trump administration unlawfully ended funding for the four immigrant aid programs without providing a reason to do so or conducting a review — in violation of the guidelines put in place by Congress, which allocated $29 million for those programs. The Unaccompanied Children Program is funded through the Department of Health and Human Services, whose budget is likewise determined by Congress.
The Trump administration's move against the four legal aid programs, however brief, had devastating consequences for immigrants trying to access legal advice at the time. Attorneys working under the programs were barred from detention centers, preventing them from providing legal counsel.
And in at least two states, Illinois and Michigan, organizations operating help desks, uncertain about the future, reported shutting down, scaling back services and telling visitors they couldn't offer help. For migrants facing deportation proceedings, any roadblock can severely impact their ability to obtain asylum or delay removal.
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