Washington, D.C., September 10, 2020—In a victory for children’s rights, a federal judge ruled last Friday that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) violated federal law when it apprehended migrant children at the border and detained them in hotels, before attempting to deport them to the very dangers they fled weeks or months earlier. 

Citing a public health rule, DHS officials have prevented children and families from seeking asylum at the border since March by forcibly returning them to their countries of origin. In that time, more than 600 children were hidden in hotels, in DHS custody, for days and weeks while the immigration officials arranged for their return. The children had no access to Child Advocates, to attorneys, or to any of the protections guaranteed them under federal law. They were held in hotel and motel rooms—two beds and a bathroom—supervised by unknown adults with no expertise in child development, trauma, or children’s legal rights. This DHS-created process violates both the Flores Settlement Agreement and a 2008 anti-trafficking law, which require children to be placed in state-licensed programs where they can seek protection from deportation and reunification with family members. 

In more than a dozen cases, the Young Center learned of children held in these hotels and fought for their transfer to safe, state-licensed programs. Determined to help end this egregious practice, we filed a declaration before the federal court to document the violation of children’s rights and explain the harm of holding children—as young as five years old, and as old as 17—in hotel rooms with strangers. In her decision, the federal judge flatly rejected DHS’s argument that detaining children in hotels protects public health in a pandemic, finding that DHS “cannot seriously argue in good faith that flouting their contractual obligations to place minors in licensed programs is necessary to mitigate the spread of COVID.” The judge expressed serious concerns over DHS’s failure to provide “qualified, specialized supervision” to children and found that the conditions in hotels “are not adequately safe and do not sufficiently account for the vulnerability of unaccompanied minors in detention.” 

Detention is never in a child’s best interests. But some forms of detention are particularly dangerous—and violate federal law. Such is the case for children seeking protection at the border, hidden in hotels for days on end before being forced onto planes to their home countries. We are grateful to the advocates who brought this challenge, and for the courage of children who continue to seek protection and assert their rights at the border.

As we celebrate this win, we know that the fight is far from over. Just last night, DHS appealed the decision and is actually fighting to keep children hidden in hotels. DHS also continues to illegally turn away thousands of children and asylum-seekers at the border under the cover of COVID-19. We remain committed to fighting for rights and protection for all children and will continue to fight against the administration’s relentless attacks on children’s rights.