Extra

Yesterday United States District Judge Dolly Gee in Los Angeles issued a nationwide temporary restraining order requiring that the Trump administration "make every effort to promptly and safely release" from custody thousands of class members in the Flores v. Barr case. LINK TO RESTRAINING ORDER. Class members in the Flores case include all minors detained by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement in family detention centers and all unaccompanied minors detained by the HHS's Office of Refugee Resettlement. There are over 5,000 children in detention. The order requires prompt release under Paragraph 14 of the Flores Settlement which sets out an order of preference for release including parents, relatives, group homes, and other responsible unrelated adults. 

The restraining order also requires that by April 6 the Government provide the court, the court-appointed Special Master, and the lawyers representing the children data on all minors not released by then including their names, dates of apprehension, places of detention, and why they have not been released in eight states. The states are California, Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, and Washington. These are the states that have 3000 or more confirmed cases of COVID-19 as of the date of the restraining order. ORR was also ordered to "endeavor to provide the requested information for all Class Members in their custody" - those detained in other states. 

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The order also requires that by no later than April 9, 2020, court-approved Juvenile Coordinators who work for ICE and ORR as part of the Flores settlement monitoring "shall provide the Court and the Special Monitor with a report regarding whether their facilities are at, above, or below capacity levels (with specific numbers) and the status of implementation of CDC-compliant guidances. The Juvenile Coordinators shall also videotape living conditions at any facility chosen by the Special Monitor and/or her expert consultant for review, as well as provide any requested information on what guidance protocols are being followed there. 

The court's injunction was issued at the request of the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law, a Los Angeles-based human rights organization that in 1997 reached a nationwide settlement with the federal government addressing the conditions of detention and right to release of children in immigration custody. The settlement, commonly known as the Flores settlement, guarantees all detained immigrant minors the right to "safe and sanitary" conditions of detention, and to prompt release, "without unnecessary delay," to a list of relatives living in the United States, including parents, grand-parents, uncles, aunts, and siblings or licensed group homes. 

President Trump has publicly denounced the settlement, and is now trying to over-turn it in a federal appeals court in San Francisco after the lower federal court in Los Angeles in December 2019 denied a government request to terminate the settlement based on new regulations the Trump administration issued dealing with the detention of children. 

Statement of Peter Schey, one of the attorneys for the class - 

We are relieved for thousands of detained children that the court has intervened to keep these children as safe as possible during this COVID-19 health crisis. Judge Dolly Gee's order that the Government must promptly release all children to available sponsors may save children's lives. The court's temporary restraining order is reasonable under the circumstances given the Trump administrations inaction to get children released as quickly as possible. The judge's order may help slow down the spread of the virus among detained children and staff and surrounding communities where children and families are detained. The Trump administration's failure to release detained immigrant children who are neither flight risks nor a danger is cruel and serves no national or local interest. Instead of spending hundreds of millions of dollars to unnecessarily detain thousands of children who pose no danger of any sort to the country, the Trump Administration should use those funds to get COVID-19 testing kits and protective gear out to local communities. 

Anyone who wants to support our work and a licensed group home we operate for detained minor's whose release we secure, can make a donation in any amount at https://casalibrela.org/donate Every donation helps regardless of the amount. 

Lawyers, child welfare experts and interpreters who may want to volunteer doing detention site inspections under the Flores settlement please go to www.reunify.org to register. We will email you when site inspections resume. 

Link to restraining order