t least 120 children remain in detention by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), more than two weeks after the July 27 deadline set by a court order requiring the agency release them because of the health risk posed by COVID-19.
ICE has had a month to plan for the release of the children, after the court order was issued on June 26 by California Judge Dolly Gee, who oversees the Flores Settlement Agreement, a 23-year-old class action settlement that laid the ground work for children’s rights in immigration detention. Per the Flores settlement, federal immigration officials cannot detain children for longer than 20 days. Despite that ruling, many children are detained for much longer periods—at one Texas facility alone, 47 kids have been detained for longer than 300 days. On June 26 Judge Gee ordered ICE to release all detained children because of increasing cases of COVID-19 at ICE detention centers, facilities she previously described as “on fire.”
A month later, the children are still detained. “It seems a month has been squandered not doing much of anything,” Gee said at an Aug. 7 hearing, according to Law360. At the hearing, both parities—ICE and the lawyers representing the children—explained to Gee that they had not yet reached an agreement as to how to safely and humanely remove children from custody. Continue reading.