A few remaining tents belonging to migrants who have already been waiting for months are all that remains of a tent camp, now prohibited by authorities, at the entrance to the Puerta Mexico international bridge in Matamoros, Tamaulipas state, Mexico, at dawn on Friday, June 28, 2019. Hundreds of migrants from Central America, South America, the Caribbean and Africa have been waiting, most now in rented rooms or a distant shelter, for their number to be called at the bridge in downtown Matamoros to have the opportunity to request asylum in the U.S.(AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) - One year after President Donald Trump ended his widely criticized practice of separating migrant children from parents, his administration is again under fire for a different kind of family separation crisis.
This one involves extended families.
Unlike last year, when at least 2,700 children were separated from parents under a "zero tolerance" program, these minors have been taken from aunts, uncles and grandparents under a policy meant to guard against human trafficking.
This policy has been the practice long before Trump became president. But the recent surge in families trying to cross the border suggests children are being separated from relatives much more frequently, and because of systemic delays, children are held without caregivers longer.
FILE - In this Dec. 16, 2018, file photo, Honduran asylum seekers are taken into custody by U.S. Border Patrol agents after the group crossed the U.S. border wall into San Diego, Calif., in this view from Tijuana, Mexico. Immigrant rights activists on Friday, June 28, 2019, asked a U.S. judge to block a new Trump administration policy that would keep thousands of asylum seekers locked up while they pursue their cases, instead of giving them a chance to be released on bond. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo, File)
The Associated Press
FILE - In this Dec. 15, 2018, file photo, Honduran asylum seekers are taken into custody by U.S. Border Patrol agents after the group crossed the U.S. border wall into San Diego, Calif., seen from Tijuana, Mexico. Immigrant rights activists on Friday, June 28, 2019, asked a U.S. judge to block a new Trump administration policy that would keep thousands of asylum seekers locked up while they pursue their cases, instead of giving them a chance to be released on bond. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo, File)
The Associated Press