The president of the United States, Joe Biden, will order on Tuesday the formation of a working group that will aim to reunify minors who were separated from their parents after crossing the border under the government of Donald Trump.
This initiative will be part of a package of executive orders on immigration that Biden will sign in the afternoon at the White House and that seek to reverse Trump’s legacy.
Biden “has made it clear that reversing the Trump administration’s immigration policies that separated thousands of families at the border is a priority,” a senior White House official said in a phone call to several journalists.
The group will work with allies in the countries of the continent to find the parents of the minors who are still in government custody.
Although there is no exact figure on how many of the minors separated by the Trump administration under the ‘zero tolerance’ strategy are still far from their parents, it is estimated that they are just under 1,000.
According to a December court document, 628 minors were still separated, of which 333 had parents in the United States and 295 in their countries of origin.
Biden will sign a second executive order focused on managing migration at the border by defining Trump’s as “chaotic, cruel and confusing.”
Among other measures, this executive order aims to “reestablish the asylum system,” creating avenues for Central American applicants to reach the United States.
In addition, it orders the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to review the Remain in Mexico program, for which thousands of Central Americans are waiting their turn on the Mexican side of the border and which Biden has already ordered suspended.
Finally, the third executive order seeks to review ‘from top to bottom’ all the recent measures approved by the Trump administration that have ‘established barriers’ to the immigration legal system, such as penalties for the use of public benefits.
“The previous administration enacted hundreds of policies that go against our history and undermine America’s character as a land of open and welcoming opportunity,” the official said.
These executive orders on immigration will be added to those signed by Biden on his first day in office.
Among those measures, Biden ordered the suspension of the construction of the border wall with Mexico, lifting the veto on migrants from Muslim-majority countries and shielding the DACA program, which grants work and residence permits to 650,000 undocumented youth.
From Diario Libre.
