Politics
Are ICE agent checks on migrant children to protect them or deport them?
WASHINGTON — When immigration agents recently began conducting welfare checks on youths who had arrived at the border unaccompanied by their parents, advocates grew alarmed, fearing the tactic was a cover to target the minors, their adult sponsors and possibly others for deportations.
Stories of these unannounced visits popped up around the country — agents who attempted to gain access to two elementary schools in Los Angeles; agents who showed up “five deep and armed” at the home of an immigration lawyer’s 19-year-old client in Virginia; agents who interviewed a terrified 16-year-old Honduran girl at her uncle’s house in Washington state.
Department of Homeland Security officials have said the welfare checks are part of an ongoing effort to ensure that unaccompanied children “are safe and not being exploited, abused, and sex trafficked.”
Immigrant advocates say some visits have led to children being forced to leave the country with their deported parents or being removed from their sponsors and placed in federal custody.
Advocates point to the case of a 17-year-old Honduran in Hawaii whose older brother had been detained by federal agents. The boy was transported to a facility for unaccompanied youths in California.
“This is just par for the course for an administration that has staked their claim on making life so incredibly difficult for immigrants at large that they think people will leave and not come to the U.S.,” said Jen Smyers, former chief of staff under the Biden administration for the Office of Refugee Resettlement, which is responsible for the care of unaccompanied children.
Fear of the welfare checks “drives people underground, increases exploitation and trafficking,” Smyers said. “And they’re doing it with this perverse narrative by saying that they care about kids. But all they’re doing is wrecking these kids’ lives.”
Those under review by the Trump administration are among the roughly 450,000 children who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border without their parents and were released to sponsors during President Biden’s term.
Children who arrive unaccompanied by a parent are placed in the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement, which is under the Department of Health and Human Services. The department is required to screen adult sponsors who volunteer to care for the children, usually their parents or other relatives.
Shortly after President Trump took office, his administration formulated a multi-agency plan to track down unaccompanied children, investigate whether they are being subjected to human trafficking and deport those who are removable. An internal Immigration and Customs Enforcement memo, obtained by The Times, details the four-phase operation.
The memo indicates that agents should prioritize youths who didn’t show up for an immigration hearing, those whom the government has not been able to contact since they were released to sponsors, those who are considered a threat to public safety and those with deportation orders.
The agency is also looking closely at youths released from federal custody to sponsors who are not blood relatives, including so-called super sponsors who have taken in more than three unaccompanied children.
The sponsorship program has been beset by problems in recent years. The federal government has failed to properly vet some sponsors, according to a federal watchdog report from last year. Thousands of children rapidly released from government shelters were later exploited by major companies.
Last month, a federal grand jury indicted a man on allegations that he lured a 14-year-old girl from Guatemala to the U.S. and falsely claimed she was his sister to gain custody as her sponsor.
About 100 children have been removed from their sponsors this year and returned to federal custody, the Associated Press reported, and 450 cases with complaints have been referred to federal law enforcement.
The review of sponsorships under the Trump administration is being led by two branches of ICE: Enforcement and Removal Operations, or ERO, and Homeland Security Investigations, or HSI.
Along with combating human trafficking, the effort aims to identify possible candidates for deportation. Referring to unaccompanied children as “UAC,” the memo states: “ERO officers should remember they are to enforce final orders of removal, where possible, and HSI will pursue criminal options for UAC who have committed crimes.”
The Homeland Security and Health and Human Services departments did not respond to a request for comment.
Over the last two months, immigration attorneys say, agents have attempted to intimidate minors.
In one instance in California, underage clients answered the door to find agents in casual wear asking about their mother and whether they had a job. Another family reported to their attorney that HSI agents arrived while the minor was at school, yet the agents returned four times in one day looking for the student.
The tactic puts in jeopardy sponsors who lack legal authorization to be in the country or live in mixed-status households, said Karina Ramos, a managing attorney at the Los Angeles-based Immigrant Defenders Law Center.
“It’s definitely going to have a chilling effect on a sponsor, if they know there are going to be immigration officers questioning their status,” she said.
The case of the teenager in Hawaii began April 9 when his older brother was arrested on suspicion of misdemeanor illegal entry, according to someone with knowledge of the case.
The teen had entered the country unaccompanied and was previously in federal custody in Texas. He was released to his older brother’s care in 2023. According to the person with knowledge of the case, when the teen was apprehended last month, agents considered whether they could deport him along with his brother.
After his older brother was apprehended, the 17-year-old was placed in a facility for unaccompanied youths in California. Hawaii has no Office of Refugee Resettlement facilities.
Before he was transported to California, teachers who knew the student attempted to aid his release, according to local advocates and the Honolulu Civil Beat. The teachers carried documents showing his aunt could take custody of him if he was released to her.
Advocates said there are intersecting operations in Hawaii — welfare checks on unaccompanied children and enforcement actions against deportable immigrants. At least four immigrant children in two separate cases were recently removed with their parents, who were targeted for deportation, advocates said.
“Having a parallel directive to remove grown-ups from children is never in the best interest of the child,” said Mary Miller Flowers, director of policy and legislative affairs at the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights. “So it feels like it’s a euphemism for enforcement actions.”
In other parts of the country, young immigrants and their adult sponsors are grappling with what the welfare checks could spell for them.
In Houston, Alexa Sendukas, managing attorney for the Galveston-Houston Immigrant Representation Project, said 21 clients have experienced welfare checks in recent weeks. Those who let agents inside their homes told her that agents walked from room to room, asking questions and taking photos.
In a meeting last week, HSI agents told Sendukas that they had rescued two children from a trafficking situation in the Houston area and found a sponsor who was producing child exploitation material. But she remains skeptical.
“We’ve heard the example of the Hawaii case,” she said, adding that advocates worry that agents doing welfare checks are gathering information they can use in the future. Referring to the ICE memo, she said, “The guidance suggests a multiphase initiative — what does the next phase look like?”
In San Diego, federal agents recently conducted a wellness check at the residence of a girl represented by immigration attorney Ian Seruelo. She is in the process of receiving special immigration juvenile status, he said.
A day after the wellness check, as the girl was visiting her parents, who live at a different location, federal agents stopped them while they were driving to church and detained them for several hours, Seruelo said.
The parents have no criminal record but are undocumented, and their status was probably known to officials, Seruelo said, because they had been in deportation proceedings that were dropped. Neither the girl nor her parents are in custody, he said.
Seruelo said he found the timing of the parents’ detention suspect. “I think they were using the wellness check to get information about the parents,” he said.
Smyers, the former Health and Human Services official, said the public safety and border security justifications noted in the ICE memo about tracking down unaccompanied children are the same justifications used by Stephen Miller, the federal official and mastermind behind the separation of thousands of families at the southern border during President Trump’s first term.
“The American public should be just as galvanized against this as they were to family separation at the border,” she said.
Castillo reported from Washington and Gomez from Los Angeles.
new video loaded: Jan. 6 Rioter Hired by Pentagon
transcript
transcript
Jan. 6 Rioter Hired by Pentagon
Elias Irizarry, who pleaded guilty to climbing through a broken window at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, now works for an office responsible for uncovering and defending against terrorism plots at the Pentagon.
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“Full pardon or commutation?” “Full pardon.”
By Alisa Shodiyev Kaff
June 4, 2026
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Democrats splintered over a resolution seeking to block the U.S. from assisting Israel’s war against Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed terrorist group, on Thursday.
The measure, offered by progressive Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., would require President Donald Trump to withdraw U.S. forces from Lebanon. For months, Israel and Hezbollah, a U.S.-designated terrorist group and Iranian proxy, have been at war in southern Lebanon, but the United States has not joined the conflict.
A bipartisan coalition of lawmakers, including House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., rejected the measure. Critics argued the resolution could aid Hezbollah and potentially hamstring U.S. military operations in the country.
Tlaib’s resolution failed 92-324, with more than half of House Democrats joining nearly all Republicans to vote it down.
The Lebanon war powers resolution divided Democrats, with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., joining Republicans in rejecting the measure. (Aaron Schwartz/Bloomberg)
REP RASHIDA TLAIB MOVES TO BLOCK US OPERATIONS IN LEBANON BUT IGNORES HEZBOLLAH
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., an Israel critic, was the lone Republican to support Tlaib’s measure. Meanwhile, Reps. Derek Tran, D-Calif., and Betty McCollum, D-Minn., voted present.
House Democratic leaders said shortly before the vote they would oppose Tlaib’s resolution and work with the progressive lawmaker on a narrower measure exempting some U.S. military operations in the country. Their statement also denounced Hezbollah as a “violent terrorist organization” and a “sworn enemy of the United States.”
Tlaib, who has accused Israel of committing “ethnic cleansing” in Lebanon, did not mention Hezbollah in her resolution. She and other proponents of the measure also avoided discussing the Iranian proxy force during heated floor debate over the measure.
Republicans highlighted the omission and accused the legislation’s supporters of serving as “proxies for Hezbollah.”
“Apparently they don’t want to see Israel killing Hezbollah, even though it’s Hezbollah that is killing Israeli children, Israeli adults, Israeli elders,” House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Brian Mast, R-Fla., said Wednesday, referring to his Democratic colleagues.
Tlaib asserted that her resolution would only affect U.S. forces actively engaged in hostilities. Republicans, however, disputed that claim and suggested it would hurt U.S. efforts to counter Hezbollah.
“It doesn’t say anything about [whether] you can keep the Marines that are in the embassy,” Mast said, referring to the U.S. embassy in Beirut. “That’s a pretty big oversight. It doesn’t say anything about whether we can keep United States armed forces that are training missions with the LAF [Lebanese Armed Forces]. Again, pretty big oversight.”
Rep. Rashida Tlaib, a Democrat from Michigan, attempted to bar U.S. forces from joining Israel’s war in Lebanon. (Tierney L. Cross/Bloomberg)
RASHIDA TLAIB HIT WITH HOUSE CENSURE THREAT, ACCUSED OF ‘CELEBRATING TERRORISM’ IN PRO-PALESTINIAN SPEECH
The debate turned personal when Rep. Max Miller, R-Ohio, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, linked Tlaib to Hezbollah.
“Hezbollah is a terrorist organization … and its members are butchers that you like to hang out with to a certain extent,” the Ohio lawmaker said, referring to Tlaib.
A shouting match between the two then broke out, with Tlaib demanding that Miller’s remarks be stricken from the record.
The presiding chair ultimately complied with her request, but Miller doubled down on his remarks.
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“Yes, I said it. I own it, and I stand by it,” Mast said on behalf of Miller on the floor.
Tlaib’s failed war powers resolution comes as Iran has sought to tie Israel’s invasion of Lebanon to its ceasefire negotiations with the United States.
Hezbollah, which has long helped Iran project power in the region, rejected a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Lebanon’s government Thursday.
WASHINGTON — Initial efforts in the Senate failed Thursday to block the $1.8-billion fund that the Trump administration has sought to establish to pay people who claim the government wronged them, though further attempts were likely to come Thursday afternoon.
Republicans narrowly voted down a Democratic amendment to ban the payout fund and then Democrats killed a Republican amendment, which would have prohibited the use of federal money for the fund but would have sent $1.7 billion to the Justice Department’s fraud division.
It was the second effort in Congress to rebuke President Trump in two days, following the House vote Wednesday to rein in Trump’s war powers in Iran.
The dueling amendments were proposed by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.). They were attached to the reconciliation bill that would fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol, a high priority for Republicans.
The votes came as the Senate began a “vote-a-rama,” during which lawmakers were expected to propose a stream of amendments to the immigration bill on various topics.
The Trump administration’s plan for the payment fund — widely seen as a way for Trump to compensate his political allies, including those who participated in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol — set off particular ire from some GOP lawmakers.
The plan has fueled growing unrest within parts of Trump’s party over his governance, compounded by the president’s endorsement of primary challengers to Sens. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Bill Cassidy (R-La.), as well as Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), which angered some Republican senators.
Cassidy, who lost his primary and has since voiced strong opposition to Trump’s $1.8-billion fund, became a key player in the Thursday votes, voting down Schumer’s amendment but supporting Tillis’.
On Wednesday, Cassidy joined with Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) to argue in a court filing that the $1.8-billion fund circumvents Congress’ authority and violates the Constitution’s spending and appropriations clauses.
“It is an unconstitutional attempt to spend the People’s money without Congressional approval,” Cassidy and Booker wrote in an amicus brief filed in the federal court case challenging the fund.
The fund was created by the Justice Department to settle a lawsuit brought by Trump against the Internal Revenue Service over the leak of his tax returns. Trump and his sons agreed to drop their personal lawsuit against the government in exchange for the creation of the $1.776-billion fund. Critics immediately questioned the plan, and it drew a rare backlash from Republicans.
In late May, GOP senators derailed plans to vote on the immigration bill over their displeasure with the payout fund and with Trump’s desire to use taxpayer funds for his planned White House ballroom. Senate Republicans removed the ballroom funding from the immigration package Wednesday, another setback for Trump.
The Trump administration sought to back away from its plans for the fund this week, following bipartisan outcry and a federal court ruling that temporarily blocked any payouts from the fund. Acting Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche said Tuesday the administration would end its plans to move ahead with the concept.
But Trump on Wednesday told reporters he didn’t know whether the fund was dead, calling it “a beautiful thing.”
After Schumer proposed the first amendment to ban the fund Thursday morning, the Senate came to a standstill as three key Republican senators deliberated. Schumer framed his effort to ban the fund Thursday as a way to force a referendum on Trump’s plan.
The amendment “offers Republicans a choice: Do you support Donald Trump’s $2 billion taxpayer-funded slush fund, or do you want to protect the American people and their paychecks?” Schumer said on the Senate floor before the vote.
Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio) urged Republicans to reject the amendment, saying Democrats were planning to “play so many games” on Thursday during the marathon session.
“We are going to fund immigration enforcement and border patrol, and I urge my Republican colleagues to stay united on that singular mission,” Moreno said.
The amendment failed after Cassidy voted against it. Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Jon Husted of Ohio and Dan Sullivan of Alaska voted in favor.
Schumer’s amendment was uniformly supported by Democrats, including California Sens. Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla.
Tillis, who also voted against Schumer’s amendment, immediately proposed his amendment. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon) urged Democrats to oppose it, saying that the proposal would create “a new slush fund” by giving the money to the Justice Department.
“We heard over the last 48 hours that the acting attorney general said that this fund’s not moving forward. All this amendment does is codify what I believe the policy of the DOJ is,” Tillis said on the floor before voting began on his amendment. “This [fund] is unpopular, this administration has said they’re not moving forward with it; this is an opportunity for us to put it to bed.”
Responded Merkley: “Taking one slush fund and eliminating it and then creating a new slush fund still under control of the attorney general is not the way to go. The way to go is to get rid of these slush funds altogether.”
Trump has faced a recent string of failures, including the House vote Wednesday, a court ruling to remove his name from the Kennedy Center and a record-low approval rating among Americans as concern rises about economic issues, gas prices and Trump’s war with Iran.
On Wednesday, Trump lashed out against the four Republicans who backed the House war powers resolution, calling it “an unpatriotic thing” to do and calling the vote “meaningless.”
“They’re GRANDSTANDERS! They should be ashamed of themselves. MAGA!!! President DJT,” Trump wrote.
Times staff writer Ana Ceballos, in Washington, contributed to this report.
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