Migrant children held in the United States after crossing the border illegally were subject to “pervasive” sexual abuse at the hands of fe...
Migrant children held in the United States after crossing the border illegally were subject to “pervasive” sexual abuse at the hands of federal contractors, the Department of Justice said Wednesday.
The department filed a lawsuit against Southwest Key Programs, which operates homes for underage illegal immigrants awaiting placement with “sponsors” in the United States. Federal law bars minors who cross the border illegally from being returned to their home country. Southwest Key holds more than 6,000 children in 29 shelters staffed by “youth care workers.”
The lawsuit says Southwest Key records show staff members repeatedly covered for each other as they preyed on children.
“A Southwest Key Youth Care Worker who in 2022 repeatedly sexually abused a five-year-old girl, an eight-year-old girl, and an eleven-year-old girl at Casa Franklin in El Paso, Texas,” the lawsuit says. “The eight-year-old girl disclosed that the Youth Care Worker repeatedly entered their bedrooms in the middle of the night to touch their ‘private area,’ and he threatened to kill their families if they disclosed the abuse.”
Southwest Key has received $4 billion by the federal government since 2019. Payments have grown as illegal border crossings increased, rising from $391 million in 2020 to nearly $1 billion thus far in fiscal year 2024, according to federal spending data.
The lawsuit comes amid revelations that unaccompanied minors who come to the United States are frequently subject to unsafe conditions. Federal employees told Congress this month that migrant children are first turned over to contractors with limited training, and then sent to live with unvetted sponsors. Deborah White, an HHS whistleblower, recalled the “horrifying” realization that “children were being trafficked with billions of taxpayer dollars by a contractor failing to vet sponsors and process children safely, with government officials complicit in it.”
White described the process as “taxpayer-funded slavery and child trafficking.”
The lawsuit describes “over one hundred Reports of unlawful sexual abuse or harassment of children in Southwest Key’s care since at least 2015.
“These instances are examples of Southwest Key’s longstanding pattern or practice of illegal sexual abuse, harassment, and misconduct against children in Southwest Key’s care. Southwest Key failed to consistently correct its practices and permitted the harassment to continue without adequate intervention,” the suit reads.
In one case, a teenage girl at Casa Kokopelli in Mesa, Arizona told a “clinician” that she missed her mother, and “the clinician turned the conversation to sex,” and said in a discussion with another teenage girl that he “can be more than your clinician if you would allow me to,” the suit said.
“Another 2019 Southwest Key Report details how, at Casa Rio Grande in San Benito, Texas, a child reported a male Youth Care Worker told him he liked dating ‘transexuals, transgenero, personas gay,’ translated to ‘transexuals, transgender, gay individuals.’”
“The Youth Care Worker asked the child if he dressed as a woman and went to work at night; while asking this, the Youth Care Worker caressed his own groin. After the child complained, Southwest Key transferred the child to a shelter in another state. Southwest Key ultimately reinstated the Youth Care Worker,” the lawsuit alleges.
In 2022 at Casa Norma Linda in Los Fresnos, Texas, two employees helped a third conduct and conceal a relationship with a 16-year old unaccompanied minor. In 2023 at Casa Las Palmas in Mesa, Arizona, a minor reported that a Youth Care Worker allegedly said he wanted to “give it to her hard” and asked, “How are the women of Venezuela?”
The same year, a boy said that a female Shift Leader “touched the child while he was in a shower, and verbally harassed him, ‘constantly’ telling him that she wanted him to stay in the shelter and ‘have children with her,” the suit said. Despite Southwest Key’s internal investigation finding that the employee committed misconduct, she “continued employment with Southwest Key.”
There was also a Shift Leader who in 2019 allegedly “repeatedly raped, abused, and threatened a teenage girl throughout her shelter stay at Casa Montezuma in Channelview, Texas.” The girl said other employees covered for him by changing shifts with him so he could target her.
The Justice Department alleges Southwest Key staff exploited the children’s illegal status and lack of parents to threaten them into silence. “A Southwest Key employee at Casa Franklin in El Paso, Texas, threatened an eight-year-old female child that if she reported his abuse to anyone, he would ‘kill her family.'”
“A Southwest Key manager at Casa Montezuma in Channelview, Texas, threatened the female child he was harassing that if she reported the sexual abuse, she would be hospitalized. A Southwest Key employee at Casa Nueva Esperanza in Brownsville, Texas, discouraged a child from pursuing a report of harassment by telling the child it would delay her reunification with her family or adversely affect her placement with a sponsor,” it added.
When a child reported sexual abuse by staff and was covered by hickeys, the employee she reported it to told her to “cover up” the hickeys and did not report it to anyone. The child reported it to a second employee, who notified a supervisor who allegedly ordered that employee not to write a report. That employee tried to report it directly to the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement, which oversees the unaccompanied minors.
Southwest Key, which has received billions from ORR, claimed it did not have a phone number for the office.
Anais Biera Miracle, the contractor’s communications officer, told The Daily Wire in a statement that the suit “does not present the accurate picture of the care and commitment our employees provide to the youth and children.”
“We are in constant communication and continue to closely partner with the Office of Refugee Resettlement,” Miracle said.
The Justice Department’s suit asks for monetary damages “to each person aggrieved by Southwest Key’s discriminatory conduct,” as well as “civil penalties against Southwest Key to vindicate the public interest.”
The Biden administration has relaxed the vetting of unaccompanied migrant “sponsors,” removing DNA testing and, in many cases, FBI background checks. In some cases, the Department of Health and Human Services knowingly sent children to live with gang members. A third of unaccompanied migrants—some 85,000 children—are currently missing.
White, the HHS whistleblower, says she faced blowback when she attempted to check on a migrant child.
“When I checked on a child’s welfare at another facility I was told, ‘Do not do that again. Once these children leave here…they’re gone and they are no longer your responsibility.’”
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