Since 2014, the Caminos program at the Board of Child Care (BCC) in Baltimore has helped unaccompanied immigrant youth overcome the trauma they face when coming to the U.S. alone. Often fleeing environments where they have experienced extreme poverty, abuse and neglect, persecution, and the impact of horrific gang violence, these young people have already been exposed to significant and acute adversity and trauma.
The disproportionate impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has been significant for unaccompanied youth and immigrant children and families. Families in detention centers are now being forced to choose between keeping their families together or letting their children leave the center to protect them from the virus. A federal judge recently ordered that all children currently held in U.S Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody be released by July 17, 2020 to prevent further spread of the virus among this population. At the writing of this blog post, children are still being detained despite the judge’s orders. Since the start of the pandemic, the federal administration, under the guise of a public health crisis, has turned back over 2,000 unaccompanied children at the border in violation of federal law.
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