BORDERLINE

Justice Department Rescinds ‘Zero Tolerance’ Policy That Led to Family Border Separations: AP

While most family separations stopped after 2018, hundreds of children have yet to be reunited with their families.

The Justice Department has ended its policy of “zero tolerance” for illegal border crossings, the Associated Press reported Tuesday. The Trump-era rule made it federal policy to criminally prosecute all migrants that crossed the U.S.-Mexico border. As children cannot be jailed, the policy meant they would be separated from their families as they awaited trial. The policy, which was both implemented and halted in 2018, was part of a spate of harsh anti-immigration policies that Trump made a hallmark of his presidency. Hundreds of children have yet to be reunited with their families. “Consistent with this longstanding principle of making individualized assessments in criminal cases, I am rescinding — effective immediately—the policy directive,” acting U.S. Attorney General Monty Wilkinson wrote in a memo to department prosecutors.