Immigration Officials Detain Sponsor, Leaving 9-Year-Old in Shelter for Seven Months

A nine-year-old girl from El Salvador has spent more than seven months in a government-run shelter in the Houston area. Her mother, Carmen, is currently detained in a Louisiana center. The child’s attorney said the girl begged to leave the facility. She reported feeling lonely and suffering from nosebleeds and a suspected infection.

Carmen was arrested by federal immigration officials while completing the process to regain custody of her daughter. The mother had a pending asylum case and no criminal record. She described the situation as a trap for both of them. "Both of us are trapped," Carmen said in a September interview. "She’s just a helpless little girl. The process shouldn’t be like this."

As of September, the girl was among nearly 1,900 children held by the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement. Congress tasked the office over a decade ago with caring for unaccompanied minors to separate that function from immigration enforcement. Under the current administration, the office has reconfigured its role to support deportation efforts.

Former federal health official Jonathan White said the administration is reshaping the shelter system from a child welfare program into a detention program. He noted that children are often held rather than reunited with family in the United States. This strategy uses children to encourage parents to leave the country, according to interviews with families and lawyers.

The average stay for children in the office’s custody has stretched to nearly six months. Some children remain much longer when they have qualified sponsors. Alvaro Huerta of the Immigrant Defenders Law Center cited a three-year-old who stayed 300 days in custody. Another six-year-old girl was held for seven months after her father was detained during the vetting process.

The Department of Homeland Security said it is working to locate 450,000 unaccompanied children who arrived during the previous administration. It claimed many were placed with unvetted sponsors, including smugglers and sex traffickers. The agency provided a list of 16 cases where sponsors were arrested for serious crimes, including rape, drug trafficking, and homicide.

John Fabbricatore, a senior adviser with the Office of Refugee Resettlement, said the office’s processing times mirror the U.S. foster care system. "ORR is not slow," he said in an emailed statement, "we are just more careful, as we should be: children’s lives are at stake."

Carmen completed a DNA test in April, which officials told her was the final step to secure her daughter’s release. Immigration officers detained her at the appointment without a warrant. The resettlement office subsequently rejected her sponsorship application, citing the detention. The girl’s sister was released when she turned 18, leaving the younger child alone in the shelter.