Trump officials identify 497 migrant children still in custody
Hundreds of children separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border remain separated, according to a court filing on Thursday.
The filing from the Justice Department and American Civil Liberties Union shows that 497 children remain in U.S. government custody, CNN reports.
Twenty-two of those children are under the age of 5, according to the report. The parents of 322 children have been deported, including the parents of six children 4 years old or younger, CNN reported.
{mosads}Only 14 children were reunited with their parents since last week, according to the government. In total, 1,937 children have been reunited with their parents by the Trump administration.
A federal judge originally set a deadline of July 26 for the government to reunite families it separated at the border, but as of that date 711 children still had not been reunited with their parents.
The family separation crisis was sparked by the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy imposed earlier this year, which referred all adults who crossed the border illegally for criminal prosecution.
That resulted in an increase in adults placed in U.S. custody as they awaited legal proceedings, separating them from their children, who were sent to juvenile facilities.
President Trump in June signed an executive order ending the family separation practice after major backlash.
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