When a child crosses the border alone and ends up in immigration court, three people matter most: the judge, the government lawyer trying to deport them, and the lawyer defending them. Under a plan the Trump administration quietly announced last week, all three would work for the Trump administration.

What the administration announced

The Department of Health and Human Services announced in the Federal Register that it is creating a team of its own attorneys — the "Unaccompanied Alien Children Legal Representation Division" — to represent children who came to the U.S. without a parent, Mother Jones reported. The Associated Press reported that the notice was signed by HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and gave no details beyond a broad mandate.

HHS told the AP the lawyers would give the department "an additional mechanism to provide these children direct legal support while dedicated public servants work around the clock to safely reunify them with their families." HHS didn't answer Mother Jones's questions about when the new lawyers would start.

Why that's a problem

Children who cross alone get special protection under federal law because they're so vulnerable — many are very young and at risk of trafficking or abuse. The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act directs HHS to ensure, "to the greatest extent practicable," that these children have counsel, and to "make every effort to utilize the services of pro bono counsel."

The rest of the courtroom is already the government's. Immigration judges work for the Justice Department. The lawyers trying to deport the kids work for the Department of Homeland Security. In the past, these children were represented by a network of independent nonprofits — the one side of the courtroom that didn't work for the government.

"We already don't have an independent [immigration] judiciary, and to have the defense side of representation also be within the government makes me feel like it's all a farce and everybody is working together to get the kids removed," Ana Raquel Devereaux, an attorney at the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center, told Mother Jones.

How they got here

This didn't happen in one step. According to Mother Jones:

• The administration ended its contract with the network of independent legal nonprofits this year, after the network refused to hand over privileged information about the children it represented. The contract expired in August.
• It then gave the job to Burke Law Group, a small Texas firm with far less experience — one of whose co-founders served in Trump's first administration. After a backlash, the firm pulled out.
• Next it went to Our Rescue, a nonprofit founded by a former ICE agent with no experience representing immigrant kids in court. That deal was put on hold after a bid protest.
• A contract then went to the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants — but in recent court filings, advocates said its lawyers often sat silently while judges decided the children's cases.

In July, we reported that the administration was sitting on $65 million Congress approved for these kids' lawyers, leaving as many as 20,000 children at risk of facing court alone.

What the government is already doing to these kids

Advocates fear the new lawyers will help deport children rather than defend them, and the record gives them reason. Last year the administration tried to fly Guatemalan children out of government shelters in the middle of the night until a court stepped in. And unaccompanied children are being detained and deported at three times the rate they were in Trump's first term.

What we know

The Trump administration has announced a new division of HHS lawyers to represent children who crossed the border alone, after spending this year cutting off the network of independent nonprofit lawyers that used to do that job. If the plan goes forward, the judge, the lawyer trying to deport the child, and the lawyer defending the child will all work for the same administration.

Source

Trump Administration Plans to Have Its Own Lawyers Represent Migrant Kids — Mother Jones