Feds Silent On How Many Immigrant Kids In NYC, Mayor Says

NEW YORK, NY — Federal authorities have been tight-lipped about the hundreds of immigrant children they've sent to New York City after separating them from their families at the southern U.S. border. Local officials have counted about 300 such children who are currently in the care of three social services organizations in the city, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Monday.

But federal agencies have maintained an "unprecedented" level of silence about how many are here, where they are or how they'll be reunited with their families, the mayor said.

"We have no indication of a reunification plan," de Blasio, a Democrat, said at a news conference. "We have no timeline from the federal government. We have no accounting for how many kids are here or where they are."

The de Blasio administration's count indicates nearly half the kids sent to New York State from the southern border are in the city. About 700 children have been placed across the state under the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" policy calling for the prosecution of anyone caught crossing the border illegally, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said last week.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services had 2,053 separated kids in its custody as of June 20, according to a Department of Homeland Security fact sheet released Saturday. Customs and Border Protection officials have reunited more than 500 kids with their families after separating them under the zero tolerance policy.

Some 1,292 "unaccompanied alien children" were in New York State as of June 18, but it's uncertain how many of them were separated from their families at the border, Cuomo said Monday.

Three organizations — Cayuga Centers, Cathloic Charities and Lutheran Social Services — are caring for the kids in the city, who are overwhelmingly from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, de Blasio said.

Most of them are between ages 4 and 12 but some are as young as 9 months old, de Blasio said. Some have phone numbers for their parents or other relatives written on scraps of paper, he said, but many lost the information or never had it.

President Donald Trump capitulated to public outrage last week and signed an executive order allowing families caught at the border to be detained together rather than separated.

While about 100 children have been connected with family members, de Blasio said the federal government has no clear plan to reunite them all with their parents, creating "barely controlled chaos" for overwhelmed social service providers. Many kids are struggling with mental health issues for which the city is working to provide help, the mayor said.

The Department of Health and Human Services is working to connect the kids in its care with their parents and guardians through "well-established reunification processes," the federal fact sheet says.

But neither that agency nor the Department of Homeland Security have responded to city officials' inquiries for information about the children, de Blasio said. The mayor himself sent a formal letter Friday to HHS Secretary Alex M. Azar II with several specific questions but has not gotten a response.

"This was true of the Obama administration, it was true of the Bush administration — if a city was asking these kinds of questions, they would get some answers," de Blasio said. "It would be normal to share this kind of information. We've never seen anything like this."

The Homeland Security and Health and Human Services departments did not immediately respond to requests for comment Monday.

In a statement emailed to Patch last week, an HHS spokeswoman said the agency operates 100 shelters for children in 17 states but did not answer questions about how many kids are in New York.

Concerned New Yorkers can call 311 to learn how to help the immigrant kids, or donate directly to the three organizations caring for them.

Cuomo said the state will provide its own resources to immigrant kids who are in foster care or placed with family members or other sponsors.

"The first thing we want to do is make sure that the state is doing everything that it can do to help the situation," the Democratic governor said.

(Lead image: Mayor Bill de Blasio visited an East Harlem facility on June 20 where immigrant kids were brought after being separated from their families at the southern U.S. border. Photo by Benjamin Kanter/Mayoral Photo Office)