US judge suspends deportation of migrant families together

A federal San Diego judge on Monday ordered officials not to expel newly reunited immigrant families for a week.

District Judge Dana Sabraw was responding to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) expressing concern that the government plans to carry out expeditious expulsions.

Lawyers have stated that newly reunited families should have time to discuss whether they plan to seek asylum and think about possible ramifications for parents and children.

The Sabraw Order remains in effect until July 23, giving the federal government a week to address the concerns of the ACLU.

Sabraw had earlier given officials the 26 July deadline to return children over five years of age separated from their families to the Mexican border

Estimate of the number of separated children at the border by the " zero tolerance "of the Trump administration.

Senior administration officials, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Attorney General Jeff Sessions to the President himself, have been heavily criticized for lying or giving misleading statements about

These blamed the policy on Democrats, implicitly implying that illegal immigrants are more violent than US citizens, deliberately giving a false perception of the magnitude of the problem and using religious texts to justify politics

. ] The administration falsely stated repeatedly that laws or court decisions forced them to separate families when they failed. The federal government missed a deadline of July 10 imposed by Sabraw for the reunification of children of less than five years with their families.

But officials said Thursday night that they had gathered 57 of the 103 children, insisting that others were not eligible for reunification for reasons ranging from safety issues and parents who had already been deported or detained for other offenses.

Government officials had previously asked for more time to complete reunifications, saying they needed more time to keep children safe and confirm their parenting relationships

(This story was not edited by NDTV generated automatically from a syndicated feed.)