Research Group Predicts the Amount of Child Refugees to Enter the U.S. in 2016 – 127,000
A research group estimated that more than 127,000 children will enter the United States in the year 2016, up from less than 100,000 unauthorized migrants that entered the U.S. in 2015, in a report released on Wednesday.
The research group, Child Trends, estimated that only about 37,500 children will become actual refugees out of the total number. That leaves 90,000 unauthorized migrants in the U.S. ahead of the U.S. presidential election where GOP candidate Donald Trump vowed to deport any unauthorized immigrants should he make it to the oval office.
“Children are coming in with very serious needs and have a precarious kind of existence while we sort out their future,” said David Murphy, author of the Child Trends report. “There’s a bewildering array of agencies and offices that these children and families pass through.”
Some children will be unaccompanied by parents, like some incidents in the past.
Latin American Northern Triangle Border Surge
The U.S. saw a rise in children migrants when a large number arrived from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. Tens of thousands of women and children fled their drug and violence plagued homes in 2014, seeking asylum in the U.S.
President Barack Obama later increased immigration enforcement measures. The U.S. government warned migrators of the dangerous precautions of crossing the border, including heightened security measures at immigration family detention centers.
The Child Trends research group has a Central American Minors program that allows parents to lawfully ask for their children in El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala to be considered for refugee status. The research group calls it, “a safe, legal, and orderly alternative to the dangerous journey that some children have undertaken to join their parents.”
Child Refugees
Although a majority of child refugees have come from the northern triangle in Latin America, large numbers this year will come from Iraq, Burma, Somalia and Syria given recent terrorist attacks in their native countries. Sixty percent of the Syrian immigrants admitted to the U.S. as refugees this year alone, are children.
The future numbers do not account for the one million children currently living in the U.S. unauthorized after not being apprehended upon their arrival.
“While these children have the potential to make vital contributions to our communities, many have faced or will face trauma that, without intervention, can have lifelong negative impacts,” the report said.
The report was sent to the U.S. State Department before the refugee’s arrival. The State Department previously vowed to protect child refugees.
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