The Applied Research Center (ARC), a think tank whose mission is “to popularize racial justice and prepare people to receive it,” reports that there are approximately 5.5 million children living in the US with an undocumented parent. 4.5 million of those children are US citizens. When parents are detained or deported, their children often face extended stays in foster care or even permanent separation from their parents.
Both federal immigration policy (backed by the Supreme Court) and US child welfare policy have the stated goal of keeping families intact. However, in practice it does not always happen. A new report by ARC examines the reasons why and suggests needed changes. (All facts/figures contained in this article are taken from the ARC report.)
ARC Surveys Child Welfare Departments
According to the researchers, their report, “Shattered Families: The Perilous Intersection of Immigration Enforcement and the Child Welfare System,” represents the first attempt to systematically study how deportation and detention affects children in foster care. To gather data, they surveyed child welfare departments in six immigrant-heavy states (California, Arizona, New York, North Carolina, Florida, and Texas) to determine, among other things, numbers of children in foster care, percentages of those children who had parents who had been detained or deported, and how the percentages compared to the immigrant population in the area. The results were then projected across 14 additional states with similar rates of immigrant populations and children in the foster care system. The numbers are augmented by interviews with child welfare caseworkers, immigration lawyers, judges, and detained immigrants.
Because the 14th Amendment to the Constitution stipulates that anyone born in the United States is a citizen, many undocumented immigrants are parents to US citizens. According to data obtained by ARC through a freedom of information act request, 46,000 parents of US citizens were deported between January and June of this year (2011), leaving their children behind. Survey data indicates that there are over 5,000 children in the foster care system due to the deportation or detention of their parents.
Foster Children Better Off with Relatives
Research unequivocally shows that foster children are better off when placed with relatives. Federal child welfare policy supports this practice. In 2008, Congress passed a bill intended to ease requirements for relatives who wished to care for a family member.
However, when a parent is detained or deported, there are many barriers to placing children with relatives. Close family and friends of undocumented persons also tend to be undocumented, and caseworkers are reluctant to place children in a situation where their lives may again be uprooted due to detention/deportation. Undocumented individuals are often restricted from public benefits and cannot be reimbursed for foster care, leading many relatives to be unable to afford care for an additional child. Some agencies require backgrounds checks using social security numbers (which an undocumented relative would not have) before placing a child in someone’s care.
Research also shows that foster children are more likely to be reunited with their parents if they are residing with a close relative or friend. Because most children of deported or detained immigrants are placed in foster care with strangers, they lack the family ties that can make reunification easier. Other barriers to reunification exist. Detained parents often do not have access to parenting classes and other services they need in order to prove to caseworkers that they are working to get their children back. And once a parent is deported, many caseworkers are reluctant to send children to, what they believe is, a disadvantaged life in another country. Often, when a parent is deported, children become permanent wards of the state.
Changes Necessary to Keep Children and Parents Together
The ARC researchers recommend changes in policy to protect families from separation. Immigration officers and child welfare systems should help parents comply with child welfare plans by providing access to classes, detention centers closer to their children, and exemptions to the usual timeline for termination of parental rights. Judges should be given discretion to consider the best interests of the child during detention/deportation hearings.
Official Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) policy is to give officers discretion in decisions about deportation/detention. A memo signed by John Morton, ICE director, states that individual factors, including whether a person has an immediate family member (spouse or child) who is a U.S. citizen or is the primary caregiver of a minor, can lead an ICE officer to drop a case against an undocumented immigrant. Also, according to the Immigration and Nationality Act, judges may decline to remove a person from the country if it is in the best interest of a child. The ARC report suggests that this discretional leeway needs to turn into official policy.
Nicole Fravel - Ms. Fravel is an educator, curriculum developer, and parent with over 15 years of experience in elementary and early childhood ...
