From The Hill newspaper,
Judge temporarily halts US deportation of Guatemalan children.
A Biden-appointed federal district judge held a court hearing on a Sunday afternoon on a holiday weekend. NPR reports,
[T]he Guatemalan government had requested the return of the children to their home country and that all the children’s parents had requested their removal from the U.S.
NPR asked the Government of Guatemala to comment but did not immediately hear back.
It’s Sunday. But a federal judge substituted her judgement for the judgement of the parents and the judgement of their home country. NPR quotes an attorney for the children,
The government is trying to spin this as child protection, but it’s not, it’s child abuse.
What? Let’s back up. How did these children (numbering some 600) come to have legal representation, anyway? Who are these lawyers? Who hired them? Who is paying for them?
The parents want them home. But a group of lawyers do not. Why do they get to decide?
You may recall at the height of the Biden border crisis, large numbers of unaccompanied minors crossing the border. Those sending them knew that Biden would not turn away anyone under 18 (or claiming to be).
The Hill quotes U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR),
This move threatens to separate children from their families, lawyers, and support systems, to thrust them back into the very conditions they are seeking refuge from, and to disappear vulnerable children beyond the reach of American law and oversight.
Uniting children with parents = separating children from their families. These are not American children, they do not belong to Ron Wyden.
The judge’s order (she is not a justice, as NPR writes) will stay in effect for 14 days.
