The summer of 2014 brought the refugee crisis at the southwest border of the United States into the national spotlight. More than 60,000 of these refugees were unaccompanied immigrant children. These particularly vulnerable young people come to the United States fleeing child abuse and neglect, gang violence, and trafficking in order to seek safety and stability. When they reach the United States these children must navigate a maze of agencies and mount a successful defense against deportation before they can live the life they hoped for.
The majority of these children are fleeing violence in their home countries in the northern triangle of Central America (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras) and Mexico. The children travel by foot, by bus, and many of them also ride on the tops of trains to make their way to the United States. Many of these children are making this dangerous journey without any of their family members.
The children are frequently apprehended by Customs and Border Protection officers shortly after crossing the border between Mexico and the United States. Many children also turn themselves in to Border Patrol officers and ask for their help after being abandoned without food or water by their smugglers. The officers must make a determination that the child they have apprehended meets the legal definition of an unaccompanied child. An "unaccompanied alien child" (UAC) must be 1) under the age of 18 2) without legal status and 3) without a 
parent or legal guardian available to provide care or custody. The officer will interview the child in order to determine whether they meet the definition. When the officer is satisfied that the child meets the definition of a UAC they will generate a document called a Notice to Appear, or NTA, that initiates removal proceeding in the immigration court. This document outlines the factual allegations and the legal reason that the child is alleged to be in violation of United States immigration law. The most common charge is that children have entered without proper inspection. The officer will then arrange to send the child to a detention center managed by the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR). These detention centers are spread across the United States.
Each unaccompanied child is supposed to be placed in a shelter that provides the least restrictive environment appropriate for his or her individual needs. Children in ORR detention receive various services to support them during the time they are detained. Children attend school, they receive medical attention, and they are assigned a social worker and counselor. The goal of the social worker is to identify a family member who might be able to care for the child during the time that his or her case is pending before the immigration court. The family member is required to submit to a background check and sign agree to provide for the child and take him or her to all immigration court hearings. Children typically stay in the detention centers anywhere from three weeks to several months while they wait to be reunified with their family members. For more information about detention standards, consult this helpful backgrounder from our colleagues, Kids in Need of Defense (KIND), the Women’s Refugee Commission and Lutheran Immigrant and Refugee Services.
When the child arrives in a detention center, a legal service provider visits them to orient them to their new environment and the reality that they are facing deportation back to the same desperate circumstances they escaped in their home country. CAIR Coalition’s Detained Children’s Program works with these vulnerable children detained in Maryland and Virginia on a daily basis to provide them with access to legal information, individual consultations with staff, and matching with pro bono attorneys for children who have a viable defense against deportation. Roughly 50 – 60% of children are eligible for a defense against deportation but sadly, many of these children will not be able to find attorneys to present these defenses. If a child is not able to present a defense against deportation he or she will be ordered removed by the Immigration Judge. After the long journey to the US, making it through detention, and finally reuniting with family members many children still may not have any legal way to stay in the United States and are faced with the reality of returning to their home country. Unaccompanied children who are able to present a successful defense will be able to terminate their removal proceedings and reside in the United States with lawful status. For more information about procedural protections for unaccompanied minors, consult this Immigrant Legal Resource Center practice advisory summarizing the protections implemented in the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008 and the updates that came from the reauthorization in 2013 in this helpful fact sheet from ASISTA.
Each child’s story and experiences are unique. If you would like to learn more about the experiences of unaccompanied children please consider representing an unaccompanied child through our Pro Bono Program.
For additional resources you might want to read the following reports:
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, "Children on the Run: Unaccompanied Children Leaving Central America and Mexico and the Need for International Protection," Mar. 2014
Vera Institute of Justice, "The Flow of Unaccompanied Children Through the Immigration System: A Resource for Practitioners, Policy Makers, and Researchers," Feb. 29, 2012
