President Joe Biden's inaction encouraged illegal immigration. The situation created was detrimental for the migrants coming in, especially children.
Unaccompanied minors held at Fort Bliss reported anxiety, panic attacks, and a "pervasive sense of despair" while being held at the Texas Army base, Fox News reported. A report from the Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Inspector General provides an eye-opening picture of problems at the Emergency Intake Site.
The report issued this week looked at the EIS that opened in March 2021 as border crosses reached historical limits. Many held there were children awaiting transfer to sponsor families or other care centers.
In fiscal year 2020, the number of unaccompanied minors was 20,000. By the end of fiscal year 2021, that number surged to over 120,000, leaving the government scrambling to place them.
With COVID-19 numbers and staff shortages increasing at the same time, the HHS' Office of Refugee Resettlement was maxed out leaving the unaccompanied children in limbo at the army base, sometimes for long stretches of time with no updates. "Kids would say, 'I haven't talked to my case manager in 48 days,'" a youth worker said in the report. "They had a sense that they had been forgotten."
"Even if someone was working the case, it wasn't communicated to the kids in any systematic way," the unnamed official said. "One girl kept saying she didn't know what was going on, and one day she broke down and said she couldn't take it anymore."
ORR leadership also reported that safety measures were "overlooked" in the rush to house the staggering number of children. "Case management staff are encouraged to strive to do the absolute minimum vetting of sponsors to effectuate the quickest releases. As a result, there are safety issues that are likely being overlooked."
The Biden administration dropped the ball when it came to caring for migrants. Unfortunately, they simply see these people as political pawns and will do nothing to rectify the situation.