Abusing Unaccompanied Minors

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TRANSCRIPT

Lack of underwear, cold shoulders and dirty rooms are just some of the abuses detailed in Wednesday's complaint regarding treatment of unaccompanied migrant children at Fort Bliss near El Paso, Texas.

Adult: "Are you coming with your father, your mother?"

Child: "Nobody."

The Government Accountability Project compiled the report on behalf of Arthur Pearlstein and Lauren Reinhold — white-collar professionals who volunteered at the emergency intake site. 

Kids were being told to board planes or buses for return trips home, only to be informed there was a mistake and returned to the facility.

Abandoned migrant boy: "I have come here to ask you for help."

Bullying among the kids isn't addressed properly.

An outbreak of lice in the girls' tent was flippantly dismissed by a camp manager.

Angelica Cienfuegos: "Originally it was supposed to sustain 5,000–10,000 children. But we've been notified it's going to even grow further."

Kids approached Pearlstein, pleading, "Please get me out of here, I don't know if I can take it anymore."

In June, the facility run by the Office of Refugee Resettlement — ORR — housed about 2,000 teenage children.

Ironically, the emergency intake sites created by the ORR were supposed to ensure the kids received better treatment — moving them out of the custody of Border Patrol and into the new government facilities.

But newly hired staff only underwent background checks after they had already started working with the kids, raising eyebrows about allegations of abuse.

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