United States

State and Federal Officials Announce Two Migrant Children Were Sent to Connecticut by Immigration Officials

Federal lawsuits were filed seeking the children's release with an emergency hearing scheduled for July 11 in Bridgeport

Two undocumented children sent to Connecticut are now getting help to reunite with their families, all fallout from the President's "zero tolerance" policy on immigration.

The attorneys for these children come from Connecticut Legal Services and the Yale Worker and Immigrant Rights Advocacy Clinic.

The legal team says across the U.S., there are only a handful of lawsuits like theirs.

Stories of how a 9-year-old boy known as “J” from Honduras, and a 14-year-old girl known as “V” from El Salvador, became separated from their parents after crossing the U.S./Mexico border and being detained, are hard to believe.

“One day ‘V’ was taken to go for a shower, and when she came back her mother was gone…and then while the boy was sleeping, his father disappeared,” said Joanne Lewis with CT Legal Services.

Now the legal team for the children is suing the feds, trying to reunite the children with their parents, who they say were both picked up in Texas while separately seeking asylum.

In court documents the U.S. Office of Refugee Resettlement insists the two children are being well cared for at a home run by a Groton non-profit.

The Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) say the boy has spoken with his father six times since June 27. The girl has spoken with her mother four times since June 21, but that was six weeks after she and her mother were separated.

The hearing on this lawsuit is set for Wednesday.

The legal team for the children is also asking that their parents can attend.

The ORR says the children's legal team did not file the proper paperwork to make that happen.

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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