In 2018, the first Trump administration announced it was implementing a "Zero Tolerance" policy at the southern border. That policy, which forced the separation of immigrant children from their parents when they were taken into custody, caused an immediate backlash. The administration was forced to reverse course, but not before more than 3,000 children were separated from their families, some of whom were never reunited.
It remains one of the darkest chapters in President Trump’s first term. Now, in 2026, the second Trump administration is again targeting children as it pursues its radical anti-immigration agenda. At the beginning of this month, the contract between the federal government and the Acacia Center for Justice, a nonprofit legal services provider, lapsed after the administration refused to extend the agreement unless the group disclosed sensitive, protected information on its clients.
The clients were unaccompanied children in the care of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR). With the expiration of this contract, more than 20,000 migrant children were left without legal representation. The Trump administration recently announced ORR would be awarding a $150 million contract to a "boutique" commercial litigation firm to provide these legal services.
That firm has just 26 employees, none of whom, when you read their biographies and listed practice areas, have experience in immigration law. Contrary to the lie that this administration has repeated ad nauseam since it took office, depriving children of adequate legal services is not targeting the "worst of the worst." It is targeting children. Children who are frightened, uncertain, and alone, many of whom will be forced to stand, by themselves, before an immigration judge to plead their own case.
Children who are taken into custody as unaccompanied minors are required by U.S. law to be treated humanely, and quickly transitioned into placement with a sponsor or foster care. While they are in federal custody, they are entitled to legal representation. The Office of Refugee Resettlement is not charged with immigration enforcement.
It is a child-welfare agency. It is housed within the Department of Health and Human Services, not the Department of Homeland Security. Once unaccompanied children are taken into custody at the border, they must be transferred to ORR custody within 72 hours.
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