The United States this week will reunite four migrant families separated at the US-Mexico border during the Trump administration, US officials said, a small step toward fulfilling a campaign promise by President Joe Biden.
The families will be allowed to enter the United States through an emergency process known as “humanitarian parole,” Michelle Brane, who heads a Biden-created task force that aims to reunite separated families, told a call with reporters on Sunday.
“In these cases that we’re talking about this week, the children are in the United States and the parents are coming to join them,” Brane said.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is considering whether they could be granted longer-term immigration status, she said.
Lee Gelernt, lead attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, which sued former President Donald Trump’s administration over the separations policy, said his organization did not know how many children remain separated from parents but that the number was likely more than 1,000.Both have been separated since 2017, he said, adding that the reunifications this week would be “the first of many.”
