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Attorney explains what happens to children after they are detained at the border

By Elsa Gillis
By Elsa Gillis

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Dramatic scenes are playing out at the U.S./ Mexico border as children are being separated from their families and temporarily held in government facilities.

Many wonder what happens to them next.

"The federal government cannot detain children for more than 20 days," Charlotte immigration attorney Benjamin Snyder said.

After being detained, the children are transferred into the custody of social services departments and placed in shelters across the country, Snyder said.

The next step is to find them more permanent housing under three categories.

Children under category one are placed with immediate family, while children in category two are placed with extended family and category 3 children are placed with foster families.

"Under the current administration, categories one or two are often held in federal detention centers at the border, so more and more of these children are ending up in our state foster care system," Snyder said.

Wherever they end up, the children are still immigrants and must go through the court system, he said.

They're lawfully entitled to legal counsel, and that's where the Charlotte Immigration Law firm comes in.  The firm just started working with a shelter in Columbia, South Carolina.

He said a shelter official told them the typical unaccompanied minor used to be older children like 12, 13 or 14 years old, who often cross the border without any adult family members.

Today, it's a different story, Snyder said.

"It appears the children that we are working with more and more are 3, 4, 5 years old,” Snyder said. “The only reason they are unaccompanied are because the Trump administration has placed the parents, who accompanied them to the border, into federal prisons at the border."

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