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Topics: Donald Trump, Politics, US News, Cancer, Health
Rhiannon Ingle
Topics: Donald Trump, Politics, US News, Cancer, Health
The Trump administration is facing major backlash after authorities posed a family with a difficult decision which resulted in sending a 10-year-old US citizen who has been diagnosed with brain cancer to Mexico.
Donald Trump promised to oversee the 'largest deportation programme in history' in his second term as president and end birthright citizenship, and we're starting to see the heartbreaking consequences of his policies.
Last month, in early February, the girl and four of her siblings, along with their parents, were removed from Houston after getting detained by immigration authorities and hastily deported to Mexico.
The family were on their way to an emergency medical check-up for the child, traveling from Rio Grande, Texas, where they lived, to Houston, where their daughter’s specialists are located, when they were stopped at an immigration checkpoint by Customs and Border Protection.
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During previous trips, the parents of the 10-year-old child - who is a US citizen - were allowed to pass through the immigration checkpoint without issue after presenting authorities with letters from their doctors and lawyers to officers at the border.
But, on this time (4 February), authorities deemed such letters insufficient and arrested the parents for not providing legal immigration documentation, despite the mother attempting to explain their unique circumstances.
President Donald Trump has previously declared that criminals would be targeted first in the administration's mass deportation efforts, but the family’s attorney said the parents have no criminal history.
In addition to the 10-year-old girl, four other children, all but one born in the States, were in the car with the parents when they were detained by authorities.
The parents were then forced to make a difficult decision to either return to Mexico as a family or leave their children behind in the US - something which NBC News outlines is 'hardly a choice'.
"Undocumented parents of US-born children, if picked up by immigration authorities, face the risk of losing custody of their children," the outlet explains.
"Without a power-of-attorney document or a guardianship outlining who will take care of the children left behind, the children go into the US foster care system, making it harder for the parents to regain custody of their children in the future."
Ultimately, the family decided to remain together.
The Congressional Hispanic Caucus have since taken to social media to call the family’s deportation 'a new low' and said the Trump administration has 'lost all humanity'.
The statement on X reads: "This is a new low.
"Trump’s terror squads deported a family - including 4 US citizen children - who were seeking emergency medical care for a 10-year-old with brain cancer.
"They have lost all humanity. We will keep tabs and we will not forget."
Additionally, Rochelle Garza, president of the Texas Civil Rights Project, an advocacy firm representing the family, said: "What is happening to this family is an absolute tragedy and it is something that is not isolated to just them.
"This is part of a pattern in practice that we’ve seen in the Trump administration.
"We are calling on the government to parole the family in, to correct the harm that they've made and to not do this to anyone else."
If you’ve been affected by any of these issues and want to speak to someone in confidence, contact Macmillan’s Cancer Support Line on 0808 808 00 00, 8am–8pm seven days a week.