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Trump Administration Has Separated More Than 900 Migrant Children From Their Families in Last Year

Authorities have separated families for reasons as minor as having a traffic ticket, according to court documents filed by the ACLU.

More than 900 children arriving at the southern border have been separated from their families since June 2018—over a year after President Trump officially ended migrant family separations. The tally came to light after the American Civil Liberties Union, which obtained the data from the Department of Justice, filed a lawsuit challenging the separations in federal court on Tuesday. Authorities have separated families for minor reasons, such as a parent not changing a baby’s diaper or having a traffic ticket, according to court documents.

The ACLU asked the judge to clarify a set of standards for separations to ensure that children are taken from their parents only when there is evidence that the parent is a genuine danger to the child, or is unfit to provide care. “The administration is still doing family separation under the guise that they are protecting children from their own parents even though the criminal history they are citing is either wrong or shockingly minor,” said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project. “This is just circumventing the court’s order.”