How Deportation Affects U.S. Citizen Children and the Family Court Process

March 22, 2016

Guest blogger: Calen Correll, first-year law student, University of San Francisco:

The United States deportation process may sometimes simply seem like the action of a government department removing a single person from the interior borders of the United States. It looks very different when you take into account the lives that the deportees have built during their time in the United States. In a 2014 article entitled Thousands of U.S.-Citizen Children Separated From Parents, ICE Records Show, author Guillermo Cantor sets the stage for the conversation on the impact of deportation on United States citizen children. The article states that in calendar year 2013 the United States deported 72,410 individuals who reported to have at least one child born in the United States. Since the children born in the United States are U.S. citizens, the process that happens when their parents are deported is a strange and often confusing one.

When parents of these children are put into detention, the decisions about where the children will live are often very dependent on the family situation that they are in. The most lucky group of children are those who have more than one parent in the United States, and only one parent is detained for deportation proceedings. In a 2011 study conducted by Applied Research Center (ARC) (now known as Race Forward: The Center for Racial Justice Innovation), the researchers used surveys of case workers, judges, and government officials to gauge the impact that the deportation of parents had on the child welfare systems in several states that have a high immigrant population and deportation rate.

In a webinar discussing the research that ARC conducted, researchers laid out the main barriers that deportees face. The first is that when Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detains someone for a removal proceeding, they are not allowed to make decisions about where their children go or who they stay with. This would be particularly harmful to the families that do not have an extended family who could care for the children. Often times the children are taken by Child Protective Services (CPS).

The second barrier is that detention obstructs the parents’ ability to comply with the family court cases that determine the custody of the children. Also included in the webinar was Kara Finck, J.D., who is a professor of law at University of Pennsylvania, a former managing attorney at Bronx Defenders, and an expert in the legal needs of children and families. In the webinar, Professor Finck describes the obstruction that detention can have on the family court cases. Often times the parents that are detained are not allowed to appear at the family court cases and sometimes they are not even notified about the case. Professor Finck also sets out some possible solutions and practices that can be used to combat these inconsistencies between the two proceedings. One of the solutions is modern video conferencing technologies that can be used if the parent is in detention and cannot appear in person. This allows the family court to have the opinion and cooperation of the parent which better serves the child’s welfare. Another important solution that Professor Finck described was the need for a good relationship between the departments that conduct the family court proceedings and the ICE officials holding the parents. This is important because the parents are better positioned to know what is going on while in detention and better able to make decisions regarding their children’s welfare.

The third barrier discussed was the fact that CPS has a hard time placing the children with extended family. They are very unlikely to place children with undocumented persons, and it is often the case that the deportees do not have any documented extended family. This barrier is particularly disheartening because of the situations that the undocumented family members are face. They are not able to help the children even if they want to and are the best fit to do so.

In the last part of the webinar, Loreta Ruiz, Vice Consul for Protection at the Consulate of Mexico in Santa Ana, California, spoke about the consulates role in both deportation proceedings and family court proceedings involving children of deportees. Vice Consul Ruiz began by talking about the main objectives of the consulate. The main goal that they strive for is to help protect the rights of nationals of their country within the United States when they are in need. This process involves the understanding of the laws of the country, in her case Mexico, and the laws of United States along with international laws.

Ruiz then spoke about the process that the consulate goes through when the U.S. children of a deported Mexican national are entered into a family court case. The first thing that the consulate does is to do its best to inform the deported parent about the case and make sure they understand the consequences. Since the deportees are sometimes already back in the country, this process can be challenging due to the limited resources of the parents. The next thing that the consulate does is to do its best to provide transportation resources to the parent in order to complete any case requirements in order to get custody of their children. This task involves sometimes transporting parents from rural parts of Mexico to more urban ones in order to fulfill the requirements set out by the United States family courts in order for the children to be given back to the parents and taken to Mexico.

The third thing that the consulate does when a family court case is started is remind the deported parents of the risks of illegally re-entering the United States. Some parents are so very desperate that they try to re-enter the country with the hopes of being able to regain the custody of their children or take them back across the border. The last thing that the consulate does is try to help place the children with family members in the United States. As discussed earlier, this can sometimes be a difficult task because of the immigration status of the family members.

Any agency that is working to help protect the rights of both the deported or detained individuals and the children that they leave behind has got to be able to use modern technology and techniques to better serve the people they aim to help. The child welfare advocates that assist the deportees and their children through the CPS process and family court cases have to be flexible in order to deal with the restrictions that ICE puts on detainees. The consulates that represent the interests of the deported individuals need to be resourceful in their efforts to provide the deportees and their families with the best services on both sides of the border.

Overall, there seems to be an overwhelming need to have cooperation between these agencies and with the United States government to look out for the welfare of the children that are left behind when parents are deported. The understanding of the issues that affect the children by the ICE officials are very important, and it seems as though everyone would be better served if the detained individuals would be able to have some say about where their children are placed. This problem has been an issue for a long time and the changing programs such as DAPA and DACA are examples of how the policies of the legislature affect more than just immigrants.