Today, the United States District Court for the Southern District of California approved a final settlement in Ms. L. v. ICE, the ACLU’s case challenging the more than 5,000 forcible family separations that began in 2017 and continued through 2020.
“While many steps remain necessary to repair the damage done when immigration officers tore children away from their parents, there is reason to celebrate the settlement,” says Catherine Weiss, chair of the Lowenstein Sandler Center for the Public Interest, who represented Kids In Need of Defense (KIND), Safe Passage Project, The Door, Together & Free, Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights, and other leading advocates for the separated families in reviewing and commenting on the settlement.
For more than five years, the district court has overseen ongoing efforts to find and reunify separated family members. As of October 18, 2023, the parties were still trying to find the parents of 72 separated children. Because the settlement significantly restricts the government’s discretion to separate families for eight years from today, it should help prevent a replay of this humanitarian disaster.
Lowenstein Sandler reviewed and commented on the draft settlement as it developed over time. Weiss advised on and improved several sections, including one that expands the class to include families who were formerly excluded under the court’s class certification order. In addition, Wess worked extensively to tighten the language that restricts future separations.
Most recently Weiss worked with nonprofit clients and several separated families to persuade the parties to extend an unworkable deadline. As originally proposed, the settlement gave many class members just one year to file their asylum applications or to move to reopen their immigration cases. This deadline would not have allowed the families the time they need to take advantage of the legal services the settlement guarantees, including individualized consultations and counseling, document preparation and filing, accompaniment to immigration court, new self-help resources, and a program to connect families with pro bono counsel and train and support pro bono volunteers. The government contracting process to establish these services is only just getting under way. After weeks of advocacy, we persuaded the parties to agree to extend the deadline to two years, allowing the families time to secure the legal help they will need. The final settlement, approved by the court today, codifies this extended deadline.
Weiss says: “We look forward to working with our clients and the ACLU to ensure the settlement’s swift and complete implementation.”
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