FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

MEDIA CONTACT

Suzanne Arnold, [email protected], (609) 610-4957

Washington, D.C. (December 18, 2020) – In response to news reports that the U.S. government will deport more than a dozen children and their parents currently held at a family detention center in Texas, Santiago Mueckay, Federal Governments Relations Manager at Save the Children Action Network (SCAN), issued the following statement on behalf of SCAN:

We are shocked and deeply distressed to learn that the U.S. government plans to deport more than twelve children and their families, despite not giving them a fair chance to seek asylum in this country. One of the children facing deportation is a four-year-old girl with a severely broken arm needing urgent surgery, which Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has denied. According to an attorney, her arm was purposefully broken as a threat to her mother, one of the reasons they sought safety in America.

The decision to send families – despite such legitimate claims to asylum – back to the dangers they fled from is, simply put, cruel and morally reprehensible. 

We implore the Trump administration to put an end to these continued senseless and illegal attacks on asylum and urge the incoming Biden administration to fulfill its promise to fix our broken asylum system that, shamefully, now delivers punishment rather than protection. Asylum-seeking children and families deserve better from our nation.

SCAN – together with its 375,000 advocates nationwide – will continue to advocate on behalf of asylum-seeking children and families, ensuring they are protected and given a fair chance to seek asylum in the U.S.

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Save the Children Action Network was created in 2014 as the political advocacy arm of Save the Children, to be the political voice for kids. We work to ensure that the issues critical to children’s lives and futures are given top priority by our elected leaders, building bipartisan support to make sure every child has a strong start in life.