The Donald Trump administration is offering migrant children as young as five years old $3,000 to voluntarily leave the United States , with immigration lawyers and advocacy groups warning that the payments could pressure minors to abandon their immigration cases, Bloomberg Law reported .
The program marks an expansion of an earlier initiative that offered $2,500 to unaccompanied migrant children aged 14 and older. Michael Lukens, executive director of the Amica Center for Immigrant Rights in Washington , said his organization and other legal aid groups had received emails from ICE attorneys offering children a $3,000 incentive to accept voluntary departure.
The offers are being made to children appearing in immigration court proceedings, sometimes by attorneys representing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and, in other instances, by immigration judges outlining the option, according to the report. Shaina Aber, executive director of the Acacia Center for Justice, said her organization had received reports over the past month from attorneys and court observers across the country about young children being presented with the offers. “We’re seeing this as part of a larger pattern of really trying to coerce children, bully children, intensify pressure on children so that they abandon their cases,” Aber told Bloomberg Law.
Some children were reportedly without legal representation when the option was raised.
The $3,000 offer also mirrors an existing federal initiative under which Customs and Border Protection has encouraged eligible migrants to leave the country voluntarily through its CBP Home app. However, immigration lawyers told Bloomberg Law they had not previously heard of the incentive being extended in immigration court proceedings to children under 14. The reported offers come as the administration seeks to move unaccompanied children’s immigration cases through the courts more quickly.
Federal funding for Acacia and other legal aid organizations representing these minors lapsed in July, adding to concerns about children’s access to legal assistance.
