By Save the Children | Save the Children
Thank you for supporting Save the Children's U.S. Border Crisis Children's Relief Fund! We'd like to provide you with some updates on our programs along the border.
Save the Children works along the U.S. southern border through a network of 37 shelter and legal services partner organizations in Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Texas, as well as in destination cities that welcome and support asylum seekers bused from the border to Chicago, New York, and Washington, D.C.
Our work at the border centers on strengthening the capacity of shelters and communities to protect children and families, addressing their immediate physical and emotional needs, offering resource support, technical guidance, and children’s programming and advocacy. Since the start of our response, we have set up child-friendly spaces for children in shelters run by non-profit agencies, distributed large quantities of care supplies to children and mothers on the move, and supported medical services.
Advocating for Asylum Seekers
Save the Children advocates for the humane treatment of the children and families crossing the southern border and their right to seek asylum. Our advocates have sent more than 145,000 letters to Congress to date. The current administration has been slow to unwind many of the policies that were previously in place. This included the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s public health order, known as Title 42, and the Migrant Protection Protocols, more commonly known as Remain in Mexico, which expelled families and children to the countries from which they were fleeing or to towns in Mexico where they faced kidnapping, extortion, violence, and even death.
After two and a half years, these policies were changed to allow children and families safer access to asylum. Unfortunately, these policy wins seem tenuous at best. Members of Congress and the administration have been negotiating a potential border deal as a means of unlocking additional funding for humanitarian and military crises around the world. Details of the potential deal have shown that the administration is willing to revert to previous policies that were so harmful to families and children.
Additionally, while Congress is willing to provide additional funding for enforcement and security measures, they have been unwilling to provide the additional funding necessary to increase capacity at shelters and fund health care, legal representation, and other services necessary to help families navigating the complicated asylum process.
Nevertheless, we have also been able to make some lasting impacts. One example is our work with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). To keep pace with the increasing number of migrants coming to the southern border, DHS unveiled the CBP One App to streamline the asylum application process. Thanks to our colleagues at Save the Children in Mexico and our partner shelter organizations in the U.S., we were able to provide DHS with regular feedback on the functionality of the app and work with them to make improvements.
We continue to be the voice for these children and families by educating members of Congress and their staff about the impact of these policies on children so that the U.S. can create a more child-centered asylum process. In 2023, we held more than 70 meetings with members of Congress and the administration to call for the end of these exclusionary policies, share the experiences of our partner organizations at the border and our colleagues in Mexico, and highlight the needs of children seeking refuge in the U.S. We have also worked closely with the Family Reunification Task Force, the Office of Refugee Resettlement, and administration and federal agencies to ensure that unaccompanied children are reunited with family in a timely manner and receive all the necessary protections and services they deserve.
We’re also committed to addressing the root causes of displacement so that people will no longer need to flee their homes. We are expanding and strengthening programs focused on child safety, education, and peace building in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico, while simultaneously increasing communication and collaboration with our regional and country offices.
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By Save the Children | Save the Children
By Save the Children | Save the Children
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