Federal Judge Bars Immigrant Family Separations, Orders Reunification

A federal judge on Tuesday barred immigration authorities from separating immigrant children from their parents at the U.S. border and called for those families who’ve already been split up to be reunited. U.S. District Judge Dana Sabraw in San Diego has given the Trump administration 15 days to reunite separated children under the age of 5 with their families, and 30 days for those 5 and older. The ruling was handed down in a lawsuit filed by the ACLU over the Trump administration’s “zero-tolerance” border policy. “The practice of separating these families was implemented without any effective system or procedure for (1) tracking the children after they were separated from their parents, (2) enabling communication between the parents and their children after separation, and (3) reuniting the parents and children after the parents are returned to immigration custody following completion of their criminal sentence. This is a startling reality,” Sabraw wrote.