Immigration Rights issue image

PJES v. Pekoske

Status: Ongoing
Last Update: January 29, 2021

What's at Stake

The ACLU, Oxfam, and Texas Civil Rights Project filed a class-action lawsuit challenging the Trump administration on behalf of unaccompanied children fleeing danger and seeking protection in the United States.

The ACLU, Oxfam, and Texas Civil Rights Project filed a class-action lawsuit challenging the Trump administration on behalf of unaccompanied children fleeing danger and seeking protection in the United States.

The groups are challenging a Trump order restricting immigration at the border that is based on an unprecedented and unlawful invocation of the Public Health Service Act, located in Title 42 of the U.S. Code.

The order authorizes the summary removal of unaccompanied children without any due process — even if the child is fleeing danger and seeking protection in the United States and shows no signs of having COVID-19.

“We filed this class-action lawsuit because the Trump administration left us no choice, repeatedly refusing to allow its unprecedented shadow immigration policy to be tested in the courts in an individual case. The policy is the most extreme asylum ban yet from this administration, ignoring all of the protections Congress has enacted since World War II to protect children and those fleeing danger,” said ACLU attorney Lee Gelernt.

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