Governor Cuomo announced steps that New York officials will take to help detained immigrant children separated from their families, but says he isn’t getting a lot of details from the federal government.
Cuomo says state agencies will be providing support services including health and mental health services for immigrant children discharged from detention into a family member’s care.
“Whatever they need,” Cuomo said. “Legal services educational services, counseling.”
It’s estimated that 700 of the children separated from their parents under the President’s immigration policy were sent to private foster care services in New York who contract with the federal government. The governor says his lawyers will contact other countries where the children are from to try to find ways to reunite them with their parents.
The governor says he’s asking the federal Department of Health and Human Services to tell him when children from other states are discharged to families or foster care in New York, but so far they have not supplied that information.
Cuomo also derided President Trump’s comments on Twitter saying people should “simply be stopped at the border and told they cannot come to the US” without due process for immigrants. Cuomo says that’s clearly against the U.S. Constitution.
