Share and Follow
In McAllen, Texas, a young father endured a five-month wait for the release of his 3-year-old daughter, who had been held in federal custody after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border with her mother. Throughout delays, he remained hopeful for their reunion.
His patience turned to urgency when he sought legal intervention, only to discover the devastating news that his daughter had allegedly suffered sexual abuse in the foster home where she was placed following her separation from her mother by immigration officials.
Last year, the Trump administration introduced new regulations and procedures affecting detained immigrant children, such as the man’s daughter. This led to significantly increased detention periods. In a bid to hold families in detention indefinitely, the federal government moved to dismantle a key policy aimed at safeguarding immigrant children under federal care.
Despite his persistent efforts to reunite with his daughter, the father’s attempts were hindered by government claims that scheduling his fingerprinting appointment was not possible, stalling the process.
According to court documents, while in foster care in Harlingen, Texas, the girl reported being sexually abused by an older child living in the same home. A caregiver observed that the child’s underwear was on backward, prompting the girl to reveal multiple instances of abuse that resulted in bleeding. Officials from the Federal Office of Refugee Resettlement described the incident to the father as an “accident” and assured him that his daughter would receive a medical examination, he recounted in an interview with the AP.
“I asked them, ‘What happened? I want to know. I’m her father. I want to know what’s going on,’ and they just told me that they couldn’t give me more information, that it was under investigation,” the father said.
The girl underwent a forensic exam and interview. Although the father wasn’t told of the outcome, the older child accused of the abuse was removed from that foster program, according to the lawsuit.
“To have your child abused while in the government’s care, to not understand what has happened or how to protect them, to not even be told about the abuse, it is unimaginable,” Fisher Flores said. “Children deserve safety and they belong with their parents.”
The ORR and its parent agency, the Department of Health and Human Services, were named in the child’s lawsuit but did not respond to emails seeking comment.
Trump administration changes release policies
The girl and her mother illegally crossed the border near El Paso on Sept. 16 of last year. When her mother was charged with making false statements and they were separated, the toddler was sent to the custody of the ORR, which cares for immigrant children in shelter or foster settings.
Children in ORR’s care are released to parents or sponsors who submit to a rigorous process that has grown more extensive under the Trump administration.
Stricter rules were imposed on documentation required for sponsors, border agents started pressuring unaccompanied children to self-deport before transferring them to shelters and Immigration and Customs Enforcement started arresting some sponsors in the middle of the release process.
Legal advocates filed lawsuits challenging the policy changes, anticipating that they would result in prolonged detention.
Average custody times for children cared for by ORR grew from 37 days when Trump took office in January 2025 to almost 200 days this February. The total number of children in ORR custody fell by about half during the same time period.
Attorneys are now turning to habeas petitions, which function as emergency lawsuits, to expedite the release of children to their parents and sponsors.
Fisher Flores, legal director of the American Bar Association’s ProBar project, said that this year the organization has worked on eight habeas corpus petitions representing children who have been held in federal custody for an average of 225 days. They had not filed these kinds of petitions for children before the start of this Trump administration.
Fisher Flores said that legal intervention helped prompt the federal government to respond to the father’s sponsorship application.
Alleged abuse wasn’t immediately disclosed to the father
After the monthslong delay, attorneys sent the government a letter in February and prompted them to allow the father to receive appointments for a fingerprinting background check, a home visit and a DNA test. Then ORR stalled again, offering no timeline on her expected release.
Attorneys filed the habeas petition in federal court and two days later, ORR released the girl to her father.
It was while the attorneys prepared the lawsuit that the father realized that the “accident” officials had told him about was alleged sexual abuse.
“Increasingly, we have to turn to the federal courts to challenge these harmful legal violations and demand that children be released,” Fisher Flores said.
The fingerprinting policy was challenged during the first Trump administration by legal advocates including the National Center for Youth Law. Other nationwide lawsuits are opposing more recent changes affecting the custody and care of immigrant children.
“This represents yet another version of family separation,” Neha Desai, managing director at Children’s Human Rights and Dignity at the National Center for Youth Law, said of the 3-year-old girl’s case.
“A bipartisan Congress designed protections around the simple principle that children should be released to their family quickly and safely. This administration has been consistently flouting its legal obligations to release children to their families, profoundly jeopardizing children’s health and well-being,” Desai added.
When the father finally reunited with his daughter, he cried. His daughter was happy to see him, too.
But after her five months in detention, he started noticing changes: She had nightmares and was easily upset. “She was never like that” before, her father said.
The pair now live in Chicago with the girl’s grandparents while her case moves through the immigration court.