More than half of the children with deportation orders are representing themselves in immigration courts, according to data from the Department of Justice.
President Donald Trump’s massive immigration crackdown has made headlines for what many view as Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s aggressive tactics and alleged inhumane conditions at detention centers.
But what is less talked about are the hundreds of thousands of children navigating the immigration court system as they face deportation.
Of the 751,861 children with pending removal cases, 57 percent, or 425,093 of them, do not have lawyers, Drop Site News reported Friday.
The independent investigative news site’s figures were sourced from an analysis of data from the DOJ’s Executive Office for Immigration Review conducted by the Vera Institute of Justice.
“The scale is alarming,” Neil Agarwal, the principal data scientist who led the analysis at the Vera Institute of Justice, told the outlet.
The Independent has reached out to the DOJ, the Department of Homeland Security and ICE for comment.
Nearly two-thirds of children’s removal cases that are still pending were opened in 2023 under Democratic President Joe Biden, according to the new analysis.
Of the children’s cases that were completed last year, 64 percent of them proceeded without lawyers, Drop Site News reported.
Among these completed cases, seven percent of children with a lawyer were allowed to stay in the U.S. with some form of legal relief, compared to less than one percent of children representing themselves, according to the outlet.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has identified more than 500 unaccompanied kids to be potentially removed from the U.S., according to one Democratic senator.
Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon wrote in a letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Wednesday, that he received “credible information” that HHS is using a list of more than 500 unaccompanied children in the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement “as targets for expedited removal under an unprecedented legal framework.”
Notably, Wyden — the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, which has oversight over the ORR — said the “vast majority” of the children on the list have legal representation in their immigration proceedings.
“Given the imminent threat to these children’s safety and legal rights, time is of the essence,” Wyden wrote. “I demand the immediate suspension of any screening initiative and planned removal action involving children in ORR care.”
An HHS spokesperson said in a statement shared by CNN in a report about Wyden’s letter, “Despite this irresponsible fearmongering, there are no plans to target these children.”
“The Trump Administration is working to identify the parents or legal guardians of unaccompanied alien children in our care because ensuring every child is placed with a properly vetted sponsor is our top priority,” the spokesperson said.
