Judge orders White House to restore legal aid to unaccompanied migrant children

SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge in California on Tuesday ordered the Trump administration to temporarily restore legal aid to tens of thousands of migrant children who are in the United States without a parent or guardian.

The Republican administration on March 21 terminated a contract with the Acacia Center for Justice, which provides legal services for unaccompanied migrant children under 18 through a network of legal aid groups that subcontract with the center. Eleven subcontractor groups sued, saying that 26,000 children were at risk of losing their attorneys; Acacia is not a plaintiff.

Those groups argued that the government has an obligation under a 2008 anti-trafficking law to provide vulnerable children with legal counsel.

U.S. District Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín of San Francisco granted a temporary restraining order late Tuesday. She wrote that advocates raised legitimate questions about whether the administration violated the 2008 law, warranting a return to the status quo while the case continues. The order will take effect Wednesday and runs through April 16.

“The Court additionally finds that the continued funding of legal representation for unaccompanied children promotes efficiency and fairness within the immigration system,” she wrote.

It is the third legal setback in less than a week for the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, though all may prove temporary as the lawsuits advance. On Friday, a federal judge in Boston said people with final deportation orders must have a ” meaningful opportunity ” to argue against being sent to a country other than their own. On Monday, another federal judge in San Francisco put on hold plans to end protections for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans, including 350,000 whose legal status was scheduled to expire April 7.

The Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008, which created special protections for migrant children who cannot navigate a complex immigration system on their own. Plaintiffs said some of their clients are too young to speak and others are too traumatized and do not know English.

The law requires the government to ensure “to the greatest extent practicable” that all children entering the country alone have legal counsel to represent them in proceedings and to “protect them from mistreatment, exploitation, and trafficking.”

Defendants, which include the Department of Health and Human Services and its Office of Refugee Resettlement, said that taxpayers have no obligation to pay the cost of direct legal aid to migrant children at a time when the government is trying to save money. They also said district courts have no jurisdiction over a contract termination that would have expired at the end of March.

Acacia is under a new contract with the government to provide legal orientations, including “know your rights” clinics.

But plaintiffs said they are not asking for the contract to be restored; rather, they want a return to the status quo, which is spending $5 billion that Congress appropriated so children have representation, said Karen Tumlin with the Justice Action Center at a court hearing Tuesday.

She said the administration cannot simply zero out funding without providing direction on who will help these children.

“They need to make sure to the greatest extent practicable that there is a plan,” she said.

Jonathan Ross with the U.S. Department of Justice said the government is still funding legally required activities, such as the “know your rights” clinics, and that legal clinics can offer their services without charge.

“They’re still free to provide those services on a pro bono basis,” he said.

Judge Martínez-Olguín is a Biden appointee.