This week, the U.S. administration was criticised for seeking to amend, in the face of an unanticipated immigration crisis at the U.S.’ southern border, the human trafficking prevention law that was applied in the case of Devyani Khobragade, the Indian Deputy Consul General whose arrest in New York last December for visa fraud sparked off a diplomatic crisis.
President Barack Obama appeared to incur the wrath of his Democratic colleagues over the White House’s efforts to close off a loophole in the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorisation Act of 2008 that would permit the administration to more efficaciously deport unaccompanied minors crossing into U.S. territory without requisite documentation.
As it stands, the law requires all such minors other than those from Mexico or Canada to be turned over to the Department of Health and Human Services within 72 hours, where they will be held “placed in the least restrictive setting that is in the best interest of the child,” until they can be released to a “suitable family member” in the U.S.
The massive influx of unaccompanied minors from Central American countries through the U.S. southern border, more than 52,000 in the first half of 2014, may be an “unintended consequence,” of this provision of the TVPRA, according to Marc Rosenblum, Deputy Director of the U.S. Immigration Policy Program at the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan think tank.
However with a Senate-led comprehensive immigration reform proposal stuck in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, Mr. Obama’s Democrat colleagues appeared to disagree with his border control solution.
“Let me make it absolutely clear I am not voting for a supplemental [funding] bill that includes changes and abrogates the rights of children as established in 2002, 2007 and 2008,” said Democratic Congressman Luis Gutiérrez of Illinois.
Similarly, top Democratic Senators including Dianne Feinstein, Patrick Leahy and Dick Durbin were said to have “voiced concerns about the proposal,” and the office of Senator Robert Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey, stated that he would not support “any legislative proposals that roll back or dilute standing law provisions specifically designed to protect the rights of children”.
