Report: Mass deportation may split up millions of US citizen kids from their parents

WASHINGTON (OSV News) — Millions of U.S. citizen children are at risk of being left with no parents in their home under a mass deportation scenario, a new study by the Center for Migration Studies in New York estimated.

The May 1 study estimating the potential effects of a mass deportation program estimated that 3.8 percent of all U.S. citizen children — about 2.7 million in total — face the potential of being left without either parent in their home as a result of such a program, while 4.71 million — 6.7 percent of all citizen children — are at risk of losing from their household one parent who is in the U.S. without documents.

Matthew Lisiecki, senior research and policy analyst at CMS, said in a statement that as the Trump administration directs “substantial government resources to try to enact its mass deportation agenda,” these U.S. citizen children “are at risk of being left with no parents” in their home.

“This would be a devastating outcome for the millions of American children who only have undocumented parents in their home, and risks overwhelming the child welfare system,” Lisiecki said.

The study further estimated that even if only a small share of those children had no other relative to take them in if their parents were deported, a mass deportation campaign could result in 66,000 children entering the foster care system, at an annual cost to taxpayers exceeding $400 million.

This influx, the report said, would increase the number of children in foster care in the U.S. by about 18 percent.

“The child welfare system is neither required nor well-equipped to handle a large influx of American children who are separated from their parents due to immigration enforcement,” the report said.

Catholic social teaching on immigration seeks to balance three interrelated principles: the right of persons to migrate in order to sustain their lives and those of their families, the right of a country to regulate its borders and immigration, and a nation’s duty to do so with justice and mercy.

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