An MD-80 aircraft is used by El Salvadorian immigrants to fly to Guetamala in a repatriation flight. It's similar to the one used to transport 32 children to Guetamala from the US.Lee Gelernt, an ACLU attorney who represented the plaintiff in the case against Trump's Trump-era policy, stated that it has been several months since the children were expelled for violating a court order. We need to give the children the opportunity to talk to us as counsel, and to offer them the possibility of returning to the US if necessary.Six months after the government admitted that it was wrong, thirty-two unaccompanied children of immigrants who were deported from Guatemala to Guatemala without a judge's orders have yet to be returned to the USA to seek asylum. Immigration advocates are urging the Biden administration not to slow down the process.Officials from the US stated that they would start the process of returning the 32 children back to the US in January, after admitting to the violation. This offer was the culmination a long-running dispute over the Nov. 18 flight from the US to Guatemala. It occurred just after US Judge Emmett Sullivan had blocked Trump's administration from returning unaccompanied children back to the US under the pretext that it would prevent further spread of COVID-19.ICE officials flew the children to the United States just 10 minutes after the court order was signed.BuzzFeed News reported the first time about the flight and the violation by the court order. US officials later admitted that the expulsion flight was against the Courts Injunction.DHS is determined to rectify the situation. They will immediately take steps to facilitate the return all 32 unaccompanied minors mentioned herein. This includes covering the cost for their flight to the United States.The US officials in court maintained that they would cover the flight costs of any child who wanted to return home and were working as hard as possible to get them there.ACLU lawyers claim that the government has not followed through since that filing. According to a source familiar with the matter, the Guatemalan government had contacted almost all families but not all. Many were concerned about what would happen when the children arrived in the USA.Gelernt stated that we believe this has been too slow and must be solved immediately. Gelernt said that there is no reason to bring this back to court. However, that will be dependent on whether or not we are able to make immediate progress.Officials from the Department of Homeland Security said that they were unable to comment on ongoing litigation.A ICE officer told the court in December that the personnel on the ground gave the children to Guatemalan officials within just 15 minutes of landing, during a time when they didn't know about Sullivan. The official said that ICE didn't know about the order until almost 15 minutes after the children were transferred. Officials later that afternoon were informed by DHS that the children could not be returned on the return flight.A court filing later cites a report from Guatemala that describes how ICE officials initially considered bringing the children home to the US right away. Evan Katz, an ICE official who handles deportation, stated in the filing that the agency had sought Guatemalan permission to bring most of the children back to the US. Many of them reboarded their planes as part of this process. Katz stated that an ICE attach in Guatemala had received an email that afternoon from a colleague of the agency stating that the single minors had disembarked and that they wanted the children to return to the US.The US authorities decided soon after that the children shouldn't return and took the children off the plane.An appeals court stayed Sullivan's decision in January as the government could appeal the decision. The Biden administration then announced, weeks later that it would not continue with its policy of turning back unaccompanied immigrants at the border. The case was put on hold while the ACLU and US officials discussed ways to settle the matter.
