What a new report says about the trauma of family separation

Judy Woodruff:

A new report out today indicates that a Trump administration policy to separate migrant families at the border is still taking a toll years after it was officially ended.

The group Physicians for Human Rights has found, many of the parents and children who were split up continue to experience intense psychological and emotional trauma. Many are showing signs of post-traumatic stress disorder. Hundreds of children have yet to be reunited with their families, all while the government navigates lawsuits around this issue and growing pressure around other border and immigration conflicts.

To help us make sense of all of this, I'm joined by our chief correspondent, Amna Nawaz, who has been following this story, Amna, going back for some time.

So, tell us about this report. And why is it important all the years later?

Amna Nawaz:

Judy, this is the first study that actually tries to take a look at what the long-term impact of that family separation policy was.

And you and I remember it well. We reported on it when we first learned about it in 2018. This was the zero tolerance policy that the Trump administration put into place, forcibly separating children from their parents, thousands of kids. It was chaotic. It was cruel.

Our reporting showed they had no intention and no system in place to try to reunite them. So this study conducted psychological evaluations of 13 of those parents, 13 parents who were separated at the border from their kids, some for months, some for years. Most of them were deported without their kids. Two of them remain separated to this day.

And what clinicians found was that the trauma is still very real and very present all these years later. The parents vividly remember their children crying and screaming being ripped from their arms by the guards. One dad remembered, after being reunited with his son, the first thing his son said was: "How could you let them take me?"

One mom said: "I don't think I will ever recover from this."

So, clinicians say they saw PTSD, depressive disorder, thoughts of suicide, recurrent nightmares, and the fear of being separated in all of these parents. And this is the key takeaway from their study, Judy. They say they conclude each of the 13 cases documented constituted torture and temporary and forced disappearance.

Judy, those are violations under international and domestic law. And experts say they require some kind of redress.

Judy Woodruff:

And what kind of redress would that be? I mean, what are they looking for from the government?

Amna Nawaz:

So, they asked parents, what would be helpful? What kinds of things would they need to move forward?

They want the work to continue to reunite families. As you mentioned, hundreds of families still remain separated to this day. They want laws passed that prevent this from happening again. They want a formal apology from the U.S. government, which we haven't seen.

And they also are seeking some kind of monetary compensation for psychological, therapeutic, support needs that they — experts say they will have in the years ahead. So, that monetary compensation is part of an ongoing lawsuit. The ACLU brought that, along with other people.

The Biden administration is fighting that in court. They picked up the Trump administration's battle on that.

And we spoke earlier today with the ACLU Lee Gelernt, who is fighting the Biden administration in court on this. And here's what he had to say about that fight.

Lee Gelernt, Attorney, American Civil Liberties Union:

The Biden administration thinks that the policy was morally bankrupt and wants to fix it, but I don't know that they're doing everything they can to fix it.

They are allowing the families to be reunified. That is critical. But they have walked away from the negotiating table to provide monetary compensation. And we still don't know whether they're going to provide a clear pathway to allow these families to remain in the country.

And I hope the American public realizes that this is still going on.

Amna Nawaz:

Judy, this is one thing we heard from everyone we talked to, was there's an assumption family separation is a thing of the past and it's been dealt with. People are reunited, and it's over. And that's just not true.

The harm that was caused has never been reckoned with. Separations continue, though not en masse. And there's actually no rules in place that would prevent this from happening again.

Judy Woodruff:

I think you're right. Many people have no idea that it would — that the pain would linger like this.

So all this is going on, Amna, as we know the number of border crossings continues to go up and as the Biden administration is on the verge of doing away with this ruling, so-called Title 42, which is expected to bring even more people across the border.

Amna Nawaz:

That's right. We have been reporting on this. The border numbers are high. They have been high, going up for several months.

They're taxing an already stressed border system. And the Biden administration says it's ending Title 42 on May 23. That was the CDC pandemic rule. It basically expelled most people immediately at the border.

So, Homeland Security officials, civil society groups say they're doing what they can to get ready. They are anticipating an increase at the border. But we have already seen, we have already seen the trafficking networks, the people who are in the business of moving people ramping up their efforts too.

And so we are seeing an increase, officials tell us, not just from people coming from Mexico, from Central America, but much further afield, Brazil and Venezuela, from India, from Russia and Ukraine in recent months as well. That makes it much harder to process and enforce the border.

We actually spoke to one sheriff, a man named Mark Dannels. He's from Cochise County, Arizona. It's a border community just east of Tucson — to ask what he's been seeing. And here's what he said.

Mark Dannels, Cochise County, Arizona, Sheriff:

We have seen from human smuggling, to drug smuggling, cash, weapons, you name it.

Over my 38 years in law enforcement working, I will say this. This is the worst it's ever been. The impact we're seeing, if you compare that to two years ago — we have our own camera system — we saw a max of 400 a month. Now we're pushing 8,000 a month.

Judy Woodruff:

Sobering. Sobering to hear that.

And so finally, Amna, what about the politics of this. We are in a midterm election year. It is just months away when people go to the polls.

Amna Nawaz:

That's right.

Judy Woodruff:

How much of an issue is immigration expected to be?

Amna Nawaz:

It's so complicated, because it's not just Democrats on one side and Republicans on the other.

A number of Democratic senators now are — some of whom are facing voters in November, we should note, are also criticizing President Biden and the border policies. We have put together a list of just a few of them we have been seeing that criticism from. They include Senators Kelly, Warnock, Cortez Masto, Hassan, Sinema, Manchin, Tester, Peters, and Coons.

Now, we should say the White House has always said, anyone who wants to work on immigration reform, Democrat or Republican, you're welcome. We want a safe, orderly system.

The system has not been meaningfully changed in 30 years. It would take Congress to do that. They have failed to act again and again. So we ended up where we have always ended up, which is, the people who are trying to enforce the border and the people who are seeking safer ground trying to cross it get stuck in the middle. And that's where we are today.

Judy Woodruff:

Immigration has been such a tough issue for so long. And what you're saying is that it still is.

Amna Nawaz:

It still is, very much so.

Judy Woodruff:

Amna Nawaz, thank you very much.

Amna Nawaz:

Thanks, Judy.