Trump team looking for ‘emergency influx facility’ to hold 3,000 migrant children
- The Trump administration is seeking contractors to build emergency influx facilities capable of holding up to 3,000 unaccompanied migrant children.
- Unaccompanied immigrant children — currently housed in more than 150 shelter facilities across the country — could be held inside an “emergency influx facility” staffed with physicians, teachers and other “humanitarian care” providers as the administration responds to “surges” at the U.S.-Mexico border, according to a call with prospective service providers on Tuesday.
- Under the proposal, facilities would house up to eight children per room sharing a single toilet, shower, and sink, enclosed by an eight-foot fence. The government typically requires at least one acre of recreation facilities per 100 children, but that “does not need to be a single continuous plot,” according to the administration. “It can be a combination of indoor and outdoor,” officials said Tuesday.
- Contractors must be able to rapidly deploy facilities to detain at least 400 children within 30 days of receiving a government contract. The expansion follows a surge in enforcement, with immigration judges issuing over 10,000 deportation orders for immigrant minors each month.
- The federal government recently awarded a no-bid contract worth at least $158 million to anti-trafficking group Our Rescue following the end of a long-standing legal representation contract.
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