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The number of migrant children in detention along the border has tripled in the past two weeks to more than 3,250, according to federal immigration agency documents obtained by The New York Times, and many of them they are held in prison-like facilities for more than the three days permitted by law.
The issue for the administration is both the number of children crossing the border and what to do with them once they are in detention. Under the law, children are supposed to be transferred to shelters run by the Department of Health and Human Services, but due to the pandemic, shelters until last week limited the number of children they they could accommodate.
The growing number of unaccompanied children is just one part of a growing problem at the border. Border officers met a migrant at the border about 78,000 times in January – more than double the rate at the same time a year ago and more than in January of the decade.
Immigration officials are expected to announce this week that there were nearly 100,000 apprehensions, including meetings at port entrances, in February, according to people familiar with the agency’s latest data. An additional 19,000 migrants, including adults and children, have been arrested by border officials since March 1.
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