{"id":9506,"date":"2023-06-15T19:56:05","date_gmt":"2023-06-15T19:56:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/freedomnetworkusa.org\/?p=9506"},"modified":"2025-10-02T12:58:33","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T16:58:33","slug":"fnusa-response-to-the-senate-judiciary-committee-hearing-on-ensuring-the-safety-and-well-being-of-unaccompanied-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/freedomnetworkusa.org\/2023\/06\/15\/fnusa-response-to-the-senate-judiciary-committee-hearing-on-ensuring-the-safety-and-well-being-of-unaccompanied-children\/","title":{"rendered":"FNUSA Response to the Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing on Ensuring the Safety and Well-Being of Unaccompanied Children"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday, June 14, 2023, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on ways the United States can ensure the safety and well-being of children who enter the US without a parent or guardian. The hearing was spawned by the revelations from a New York Times article that companies had illegally hired children to work long hours in dangerous jobs, most of them minors who had entered the US as unaccompanied children. <\/span>The safety of children in the US, whether citizens or non-citizens, should be a top priority of lawmakers. However, much of what we heard may set a dangerous precedent for how Congress will attempt to remedy child labor issues.<\/b><\/p>\n

Our network includes some of the leading experts on labor trafficking, including child labor, in this country. The testimony and statements from members of Congress promoting securing the border and removing the protections for unaccompanied children in the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) are rooted in racism and xenophobia. The TVPA protections require that all unaccompanied children entering the US be screened for human trafficking and be placed into protective custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR). Without this protocol in place, unaccompanied children will be deported back to dangerous conditions and potential exploitation. These children make the dangerous journey, walking hundreds of miles to escape poverty, political unrest, violence, and human trafficking. <\/span>\u00a0These protections are an <\/b>essential <\/i><\/b>trafficking prevention measure. Without them, the US is enabling the exploitation and trafficking of children at home and abroad.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

These unfounded and racist proposals are not the solution to protecting unaccompanied children in the US. We know the solutions that work to prevent child labor and child trafficking are ones that reduce the vulnerabilities of children and their families and protect workers, not ones that reduce access to lifesaving immigration options. <\/span>We cannot promote policies that force people into poverty or unsafe immigration status. Instead, we must:<\/b><\/p>\n