Immigrant Children Allegedly Lost Under Biden Administration

Health and Human Services Director Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has brought to light concerns regarding the welfare of immigrant children reportedly lost during the Biden administration, asserting that staff prioritized speed over safety.

During an interview on “Fox & Friends Weekend,” Kennedy stated, “What we discovered was 476,000 unaccompanied children lost during the Biden administration.” He suggested that the administration’s eagerness to expedite the release of children from detention led to a lack of essential security measures when adults came to collect them.

Kennedy expressed that basic safeguards, such as DNA testing, fingerprinting, and identification checks, were overlooked. He contrasted this with practices from the Trump administration, where he claimed these protocols were followed meticulously.

“We’re doing income verification, we’re doing DNA testing, we’re fingerprinting everyone who comes in and says they’re parents,” he noted. So far, federal officials have reportedly knocked on the doors of around 82,000 individuals, successfully retrieving about 22,000 children.

“We’ll continue doing that for the next three and a half years and try to find all the children that are lost,” he added.

Kennedy’s statements resonated with a broader Republican critique concerning the Biden administration’s handling of unaccompanied minors. According to an August 2024 report from the Department of Homeland Security’s General’s Office, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency transferred over 448,000 migrant children to HHS between 2019 and 2023.

This report emphasized that ICE struggled to keep track of many of these children after their release, particularly regarding court appearances and follow-ups. However, a report by the Associated Press clarified that these findings do not imply that the children were missing or trafficked, but highlight flaws in record-keeping and tracking processes.