By Kevin Sieff
Pharr, Tex. — On paper, he’s a devoted U.S. citizen. (click here)
His official American birth certificate shows he was delivered by a midwife in Brownsville, at the southern tip of Texas. He spent his life wearing American uniforms: three years as a private in the Army, then as a cadet in the Border Patrol and now as a state prison guard.
But when Juan, 40, applied to renew his U.S. passport this year, the government’s response floored him. In a letter, the State Department said it didn’t believe he was an American citizen
As he would later learn, Juan is one of a growing number of people whose official birth records show they were born in the United States but who are now being denied passports — their citizenship suddenly thrown into question. The Trump administration is accusing hundreds, and possibly thousands, of Hispanics along the border of using fraudulent birth certificates since they were babies, and it is undertaking a widespread crackdown on their citizenship....
27 August 2018
By Bethania Palma
Hundreds of migrant children (click here) separated from their parents under the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy have yet to be reunited with their parents, according to attorneys representing the families.
Overall, a total of 2,654 children were taken from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border under the policy that began in April 2018 and was effectively ended in June 2018, when a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) in a class action lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Judge Dana Sabraw ordered the policy be discontinued and families reunified.
As of a 24 August 2018 status conference in that case, 528 children remained in the care of the federal government and had not been reunified with their separated parents. Of those children, 343 were separated from a parent who has since been deported and is no longer in the U.S. Another 203 have been released from government custody to a U.S. sponsor (typically a family member, such as an aunt, grandparent, or the other parent). Those children have yet to be reunified with the parents from whom they were separated at the border, according to the ACLU.
In issuing the 26 June 2018 TRO, Judge Sabraw gave the federal government until 26 July 2018 to reunite all separated families. Despite the slow progress, he said during the 24 August status conference that it “seems we are on a very good trajectory here.”...
