HHS sued for cutting program that provides legal aid for migrant children
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(WASHINGTON) — Organizations that provide legal aid to migrant children have filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services after the agency cut funding to the program that provides legal representation to tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors.
According to the lawsuit filed on Thursday, some of the groups that received federal grants have had to stop taking on new clients and “face the real threat of not being able to continue their ongoing representations.”
Last week, groups that have collectively received over $200 million in federal grants were told that the contract was partially terminated, ending the funding for legal representation and for the recruitment of attorneys to represent migrant children.
Currently, 26,000 migrant children receive legal representation through the funding.
The groups, which filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, are asking a federal judge to issue an injunction and block HHS from ceasing funding for legal representation for unaccompanied children.
“As a consequence of Defendants ordering Plaintiffs to stop providing direct legal services, many unaccompanied children will never speak to a lawyer, will never apply for immigration relief for which they are eligible, will remain in tenuous status for longer, and will not understand what is happening as they are rushed through adversarial removal proceedings,” the groups said in the filing.
ABC News has reached out to HHS for comment.
The groups added that the cuts in the funding will cause immigration judges to spend more time on cases for unaccompanied children who appear in court without a lawyer “at a time when the immigration court backlog is already at an all-time high.”
“Defendants’ actions will also cause chaos throughout the immigration legal system and are particularly harmful because they come at a time when the government is reinstating expedited docketing for removal cases for unaccompanied children,” the groups said.
In a statement, Sam Hsieh, an attorney for the Amica Center, one of the groups that represent migrant children, called the decision to terminate the programs “the most brazen attack on immigrant children since family separation.”
“The Trump Administration’s decision to terminate these national legal service programs poses a significant threat to the rights of already vulnerable unaccompanied immigrant children,” Hsieh said. “Many of these children are eligible for immigration relief but are unable to meaningfully seek it without an attorney.”
(WASHINGTON) — In February 2023, El Salvador President Nayib Bukele posted to social media a tightly edited video with dramatic music showing thousands of men, with their heads pushed down, being transferred to the country’s newest prison: the Terrorism Confinement Center.
“Early this morning, in a single operation, we transferred the first 2,000 gang members to the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT),” Bukele said on X. “This will be their new home, where they will live for decades, unable to do any more harm to the population.”
Two weeks ago, Bukele posted a similar video on X in which hundreds of men in white uniforms, with their heads shaved, are seen running bent over while being moved into the mega prison. But this time, the individuals weren’t criminals who were arrested in El Salvador.
The video showed CECOT receiving over 200 Venezuelan migrants who are alleged to be members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. The migrants were sent to El Salvador by U.S. authorities under the Alien Enemies Act, as part of a $6 million deal the Trump administration arranged in their effort to crack down on illegal immigration.
CECOT, one of Latin America’s largest prisons, was opened as part of a crackdown on criminal gangs in El Salvador, whose incarceration rate is one of the highest in the world. The mega prison, which can hold up to 40,000 detainees, has been criticized by human rights groups over alleged human rights violations.
U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was scheduled to visit the prison on Wednesday along with the Salvadorian minister of justice.
The move by the Trump administration to deport alleged migrant gang members to a notorious prison in another country, without due process, has sparked an outcry from relatives of some of the detainees and by immigration advocates and attorneys who say that some of those deported were not Tren de Aragua gang members.
An official with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement last week acknowledged in a sworn declaration that “many” of the noncitizens deported last week under the Alien Enemies Act did not have criminal records in the United States. Administration officials have not been clear about the evidence they have that shows the detainees are gang members.
In a subsequent sworn declaration, ICE Acting Field Office Director of Enforcement and Removal Operations Robert Cerna argued that “the lack of specific information about each individual actually highlights the risk they pose” and “demonstrates that they are terrorists with regard to whom we lack a complete profile.”
The declaration was included in the Trump administration’s recent motion to vacate Judge James Boasberg’s temporary restraining order blocking deportations pursuant to the Alien Enemies Act.
“While it is true that many of the [Tren de Aragua gang] members removed under the AEA do not have criminal records in the United States, that is because they have only been in the United States for a short period of time. The lack of a criminal record does not indicate they pose a limited threat,” Cerna said.
Ivannoa Sanchez, who told ABC News that her husband, Jose Franco Caraballo Tiapa, is being held at CECOT, said that he has never been in trouble with the law.
“He has never done anything, not even a fine, absolutely nothing,” said Sanchez.
“I can’t rest, I don’t even eat, I haven’t even had juice or water because I know he isn’t eating either,” Sanchez said.
Juanita Goebertus, the director of the Americas Division of the advocacy group Human Rights Watch, told ABC News that detainees in CECOT, as well as other prisons in El Salvador, are denied communication with their relatives and lawyers, and only make court appearances in online hearings, often in groups of several hundred detainees at the same time.
“The Salvadoran government has described people held in CECOT as ‘terrorists,’ and has said that they ‘will never leave,'” Goebertus said, adding that the Human Rights Watch is not aware of any detainees who have ever been released from CECOT.
According to human rights advocates and immigration attorneys, CECOT prisoners only leave their cell for 30 minutes a day and sleep on metal beds in overcrowded cells.
“They only have about half an hour outside of their windowless cells to be outside in a hallway of the prison,” Margaret Cargioli, an attorney for the nonprofit Immigrant Defenders Law Center, told ABC News. “They are overcrowded within each of the cells, and they’re sleeping on metal.”
For years, Amnesty International has published reports on detention centers and prisons in El Salvador, and has alleged systematic abuse of detainees and “patterns of grave human rights violations.” Those findings were acknowledged in a 2023 human rights report published by the U.S. Department of State that said there have been significant human rights issues in Salvadoran prisons.
Ana Piquer, the Americas director at Amnesty International, called the detainment in El Salvador of the Venezuelan migrants a “disregard of the U.S. human rights obligations.”
“Amnesty International has extensively documented the inhumane conditions within detention centers in El Salvador, including the Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo (CECOT) where those removed are now being held, ” Piquer said in a statement. “Reports indicate extreme overcrowding, lack of access to adequate medical care, and widespread ill-treatment amounting to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment.”
Attorneys representing some of the Venezuelan migrants told ABC News that the lack of communication is a special concern — as opposed to the U.S., where detainees can communicate with their families and attorneys.
“There’s no communication with family or counsel,” Cargioli said of CECOT. “The concern just raises to an entirely other level.”
(WASHINGTON) — The Treasury Department has promoted two IRS whistleblowers who accused the Justice Department under President Joe Biden of granting his son, Hunter Biden, special treatment during a yearslong probe into his tax affairs.
Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler, two veteran IRS investigators, will serve as senior advisors to incoming Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who said in a statement on Tuesday that he was “pleased to welcome Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler to the Treasury Department, where they will help us drive much-needed cultural reform within the IRS.”
Shapley and Ziegler came forward in 2023 with allegations that the Biden administration improperly interfered in an investigation into Hunter Biden’s unpaid taxes led by then-U.S. Attorney for Delaware David Weiss — claims that Justice Department and FBI officials fiercely disputed at the time.
“It appeared to me, based on what I experienced, that the U.S. Attorney in Delaware in our investigation was constantly hamstrung, limited and marginalized by DOJ officials,” Ziegler said during congressional testimony in July 2023.
Days after Shapley and Ziegler testified on Capitol Hill, a plea deal negotiated by Hunter Biden and the Justice Department fell apart under questioning from a federal judge. The deal would have allowed Hunter Biden to plead guilty to a pair of tax-related misdemeanors and enter into a pretrial diversion agreement on a felony gun charge.
Weiss, the Trump-appointed prosecutor who led the probe into Hunter Biden, repeatedly refuted the claims leveled by Shapley and Ziegler and asserted that he faced no political pressure from Biden administration officials to grant Hunter Biden any special treatment.
Hunter Biden later pleaded guilty to nine tax-related charges, including multiple felonies. His father granted him a sweeping pardon in the waning weeks of his presidency.
Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, touted his role in securing promotions for Shapley and Ziegler in a statement Tuesday. Grassley said he wrote Bessent multiple letters encouraging him to promote the two whistleblowers.
“Gary Shapley and Joe Ziegler put their entire careers on the line to stand up for the truth, and instead of being thanked, the Biden administration treated them like skunks at a picnic,” Grassley wrote in a press release. “I hope today is the first of many redemption stories for whistleblowers who’ve been mistreated.”
(NEW ORLEANS) — Just a little over a month since 14 people were killed and dozens more were injured in a truck-ramming terror attack on New Orleans’ Bourbon Street, the victims and first responders of the rampage will be honored at Super Bowl LIX on Sunday, according to the NFL.
For the eleventh time, the Super Bowl will be played in the Big Easy, but the normally festive atmosphere will include a somber tribute to the victims and the heroes of the New Year’s Day tragedy.
While the NFL is keeping details of the ceremony under wraps, league spokesperson Brian McCarthy told ABC News, “We will appropriately honor the victims and first responders.”
The big game between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles will be played in front of more than 75,000 fans expected to attend the game at the Caesars Superdome and millions more around the world watching on TV.
Among the crowd at the game are expected to be some of the survivors of the attack, firefighters and paramedics who rushed to the chaotic scene to treat the injured, and police who stopped the attack by killing the suspect during a gun battle.
During the Sugar Bowl, a college football playoff game that was delayed a day due to the attack, New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell led a moment of silence before the game, also played at the Superdome, and former President Joe Biden addressed the crowd in a video statement, saying, “The spirit of New Orleans can never be kept down.”
President Donald Trump is planning to attend Sunday’s Super Bowl, according to White House officials. It will mark the first time a sitting president will appear at the game.
A spokesperson for the city of New Orleans referred ABC News to the NFL about Sunday’s plans to honor the victims and first responders of the Jan. 1 attack.
Over the past week, players on the Super Bowl teams, as well as the New Orleans Saints, have been surprising survivors of the attack with tickets to the big game.
On Monday, Saints linebacker Demario Davis teamed up with a furniture company to gift Stevey Kells, a nurse who rushed to provide first aid to victims of the attack, with tickets to the game.
It’s a resilient city. That response began with the first responders, those who were on scene and those who had to react quickly, and she was there,” Davis told reporters after presenting Kells the tickets. “So, it means a lot. To be able to give back to somebody who’s given so much, was awesome. That’s what it’s all about.”
Eagles players also gifted Super Bowl tickets to Ryan Quigley, a former Princeton University football player and Eagles fan who was injured in the attack and whose friend, 27-year-old Martin “Tiger” Bech, was killed.
Eagles player Brandon Graham surprised Quigley with two Super Bowl tickets last week after the team invited Quigley and Bech’s sister to the Eagles practice facility in Philadelphia.
“We wanted to tell you the real reason we brought you. It’s OK if you’re not feeling it, but we would love to have you down for the Super Bowl,” Graham told Quigley in a video the team shared on its Facebook page.
In the video, Quigley said his best friend, Bech, was the “biggest fan” of the Eagles.
“We went to every home game last year,” Quigley told Graham in the video. “All year… I told him if we make it, ‘I promise I’m gonna take you to the Super Bowl.’ So, I’d love nothing more than to still take him.”
The Super Bowl will unfold under tight security with more than 2,700 state, federal and local law enforcement members securing the game, according to officials.
“We have reviewed and re-reviewed all the details of what happened on Jan. 1,” NFL Chief of Security Cathy Lanier said during a news conference on Monday. “We have reviewed and re-reviewed each of our roles within the overarching security plan, and we have reassessed and stressed tested — our timing, our communication protocols, our contingency measures and our emergency response plans multiple times over, over the past several weeks.”
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said at least 700 Homeland Security personnel will be on the ground in New Orleans to bolster security at the game and more will be added if the need arises. Noem said that at this point, there have been no specific credible threats reported.
“This Super Bowl exemplifies how we come together to safeguard our traditions, how we come together to make sure that the public is well-informed and gets the chance to celebrate something that is very special to us, our culture, to our people and our families,” Noem said.
