ICE Deportations Intensify Family Separation Concerns Despite Agency Guidelines

The Trump administration’s immigration enforcement policies are leading to increased family separations, despite stated guidelines intended to prevent such outcomes, according to a recent report. Parents are being deported without adequate opportunity to arrange care for their children, leaving many in precarious situations and causing significant trauma to both parents and children.

Report Details Experiences of Deported Parents

A report released on Wednesday by the Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) and Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) details the experiences of parents recently deported to Honduras. Researchers interviewed dozens of parents who reported being forced to leave their children in the care of friends, relatives, or even babysitters—many of whom are too vulnerable to deportation—while they were deported. Many parents reported symptoms of psychological trauma, including difficulty eating or sleeping, physical pain, and acute emotional distress.

ICE Agents Allegedly Disregard Parental Status

The report alleges that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents frequently failed to follow their own directives to inquire about parents’ children and provide opportunities to produce arrangements for their care. One 22-year-ancient mother of a two-year-old stated, “They didn’t ask me anything. They didn’t talk to me, only to yell at me, to humiliate. They never said: ‘You have a daughter, you can bring her,’ since I would have brought [my daughter] she is very attached to me.”

Other parents reported being ignored when informing arresting officers about their children. In one instance, a mother with three children present at the time of her detention and three more at home was “dismissed” when she informed officers about her other children, resulting in family separation.

Concerns Over Due Process and Cruelty

The WRC and PHR report highlights instances where parents were forced to leave children in unsafe or unstable situations. One father was arrested after leaving his three-year-old daughter with a babysitter and was prevented from informing the caretaker about the situation. The babysitter cared for the child for 11 days until the father’s return. Another mother was forced to leave her four children alone until their grandmother could arrive from out of state.

Michele Heisler, a physician with PHR, stated that ICE’s failure to adhere to its own directives will “create a really high burden of mental health distress.” She added that the level of cruelty is “hard for all of us to understand.”

Administration Claims Contradicted by Reports

Despite numerous reports to the contrary, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) continues to claim that it does not separate children from their parents.

Policy Changes and Funding Increase

The Trump administration weakened protections for families in its “Detained Parents Directive” in 2025, removing a guideline requiring ICE agents to consider parental status when deciding whether to detain or deport individuals. However, agents are still required to allow parents to bring their children when deported and to determine what happens to their children during detention or removal.

The impacts of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA), which allocates nearly $170 billion to immigration enforcement over four years, are expected to exacerbate these issues as enforcement efforts are “fully realized” in the coming months. Council on Foreign Relations

Calls for Reform and Congressional Action

The WRC and PHR are calling on Congress to codify parental interest protections, including the right to reunification with children before and after deportation. They also urge Congress to require ICE to coordinate with state child welfare agencies and for DHS to appoint a national coordinator on child welfare.

Democrats in the Senate have vowed to block funding for ICE and other DHS agencies until the administration agrees to immigration enforcement reforms, focusing on issues such as federal agents wearing masks and entering private property without warrants.