The parents of seven more children separated under the Trump administration’s strict border policies have been found since Wednesday, said a lawyer who worked to bring families together.
This brings the number of children whose parents have not yet been reached to 499, said Lee Gelernt, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union who has participated in an effort to find the families of separated children.
On Wednesday, lawyers working to bring families together reported that they met the parents of 105 children last month.
The steering committee for lawyers and pro bono advocates then said they had not yet found the parents of 506 children, compared to 611 on Jan. 14 – so finding the parents of seven more children raised that number to 499.
Thousands of parents were separated from their children under President Donald Trump, who instituted a “zero tolerance” policy and other measures on the U.S.-Mexico border.
President Joe Biden’s government recently formed a task force that will place the responsibility of finding and reuniting families separated by the Trump administration in the hands of the federal government.
The number of parents who have been reached is not the same as those who have been reunited, said Gelernt.
The lawyers hope to provide Biden’s task force soon with a number of how many have been assembled, he said. One of the main reasons why many parents remain separated is that they do not want to bring their children from the United States back to dangerous countries of origin, according to Gelernt.
Phil Helsel contributed.