On Friday, September 24, Lawyers for Good Government (L4GG) and its immigrants’ rights initiative Project Corazon joined a diverse coalition of 28 other organizations to file an amici curiae (“friends of the court”) brief illustrating the particular harm and suffering that Title 42 - a racist Trump-era policy that uses the pretense of the pandemic to expel migrants—inflicts on children and their families. The brief was filed in response to a motion earlier this month by the State of Texas that would force the Biden administration to apply Title 42 to unaccompanied children and certain family units, returning them to the very violence and persecution from which they flee. While the amici assert that Title 42 is unlawful and should not be applied to anyone, the brief employs legal analysis and relates the traumatic experiences of asylum seekers to illustrate the exceptional vulnerability of children and their families under this policy.
“By misapplying an obscure and racist public health law, the Biden Administration is complicit in illegally violating the human rights of asylum seekers. The rapid and consistent expulsions of asylum seekers to Mexico that have occurred since March 19, 2020, have put them at extremely high risk of abuse, kidnapping, rape, and other violence. The Biden administration’s failure to find a solution to ensure asylum seeker’s rights to apply for asylum, nor to continue exceptions to Title 42 for severely vulnerable asylum seekers, is a travesty.”
Not only has Title 42 been widely condemned by human rights organizations, it has also been denounced by epidemiologists and public health experts as having no basis in science. In addition, the brief specifically argues that expelling unaccompanied children violates the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA), which affords special protections to unaccompanied children in recognition of their “specialized needs” and in response to the “special obligation [of the US] to ensure that these children are treated humanely and fairly.”
The stories cited in the brief illustrate harrowing ordeals of physical and emotional trauma Title 42 has subjected children and families to, including kidnapping, rape, and other forms of violence.
One example from the brief is the story of “Luz,” a 16-year-old who fled sexual abuse in Honduras with her mother, and after a perilous, two-month-long journey to the US, was expelled to Mexico, where they suffered assault and robbery by Mexican officials, and Luz was raped by a group of men.
Another story cited in the brief is that of 15-year-old “Isaías,” also from Honduras, who fled his home because of death threats by gang members. After presenting to U.S. immigration officials for asylum at the border, he was detained and put on a plane, believing to be en route to unite with a family member in New York. When he landed, he realized he was back in Honduras, and continues to experience the same violence and threats from the very gang members he had risked his life to escape.
These stories in the brief represent just a fraction of the pain and suffering the policy has inflicted upon asylum seekers since the start of the pandemic. Undoubtedly, this trauma has long-lasting effects which will be endured for decades, if not lifetimes. It is unconscionable for the State of Texas to specifically seek to subject them to the horrors of Title 42, in violation of their due process rights and our legal obligations as a nation to protect them. Amici are grateful to O’Melveny & Myers LLP for acting as pro bono counsel on this brief.