As American families are being torn apart by the pressures of continuing COVID-19 mitigation measures, rising inflation, and fentanyl flowing over the border, more and more kids are landing in foster care. The various states’ foster care systems, overloaded before the COVID-19 pandemic, are now at a breaking point.
It is now, in the middle of this untenable situation, that residents of states like Arizona received the news that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) was setting up a new program for youth who entered the country illegally.
ICE issued a Request For Proposals from contractors “to establish a Young Adult Case Management Program (YACMP). The request for proposal (RFP) was posted on January 28, 2022 for interested contractors who can establish a program that provides appropriate monitoring services for participating young adults while promoting compliance with immigration obligations and release conditions,” according to the ICE announcement.
The services will be provided while these young adults await final determination of their immigration cases:
The YACMP will be managed through ICE’s Juvenile and Family Management Unit and is designed to assist young adults who age out of Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) custody, are released from U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) or ICE custody, or who are currently reporting to ICE’s non-detained docket. This program will not include GPS or other monitoring technology. Through a network of community and nongovernmental organizations, the YACMP will provide:
- Legal orientation programs
- Referrals to legal service providers
- Communications with ICE or Executive Office of Immigration Review (EOIR) for court dates and ICE reporting
- Human trafficking screenings
- Consulate communications
- Referrals to social service providers
- Repatriation services
According to one of the memoranda written to justify the program, “It is estimated that there are more than 11 million undocumented or otherwise removable noncitizens in the United States. We do not have the resources to apprehend and seek the removal of every one of these noncitizens. Therefore, we need to exercise our discretion and determine whom to prioritize for immigration enforcement action.”
“It is well established in the law that federal government officials have broad discretion to decide who should be subject to arrest, detainers, removal proceedings, and the execution of removal orders,” wrote Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in a memo dated September 30, 2022. The exercise of prosecutorial discretion in the immigration arena is a deep-rooted tradition. The United States Supreme Court stated this clearly in 2012: “A principal feature of the removal system is the broad discretion exercised by immigration officials. Federal officials, as an initial matter, must decide whether it makes sense to pursue removal at all.”
Documents associated with the RFP indicate that the offices will be set-up in a handful of the country’s largest cities. The new offices in Phoenix, Dallas, El Paso and Houston are expected to handle the largest number of these youth.
“As usual, the first priority for the Biden Administration is those here illegally, which will encourage more lawlessness and more illegal border crossings,” said Arizona State Sen. Kelly Townsend, who has fought over the years for increased services for Arizona’s foster care wards. “We need a wall, a secure border, and enforcement of our laws, because encouraging bad behavior is going to get more people hurt or killed.”
