Immigration advocates respond to Ricketts' denial of federal request to house migrant children
109 migrant children have been released to family member sponsors in Nebraska over the past five months alone
109 migrant children have been released to family member sponsors in Nebraska over the past five months alone
109 migrant children have been released to family member sponsors in Nebraska over the past five months alone
Gov. Pete Ricketts' refusal to allow unaccompanied migrant children to be temporarily housed in Nebraska, per request by the federal government, is getting responses from immigrant advocates.
Attorney Erik Omar, executive director of the Immigrant Legal Center in Omaha, said parents in Central America feel the dangerous trek through Mexico to the U.S. Southern border is the only option to save their kids.
"These three countries have been impacted heavily in the last few years by natural disasters and gang violence."
The White House is calling on other states to help house the children, Ricketts said Nebraska will not help, because it's the Biden administration's responsibility.
"What they've done is gone to different states and ask them to do things like put a thousand kids in a convention center," Ricketts said.
Omar said federal funds would've paid to house the children here. But, he said as asylum seekers, the kids would not necessarily qualify for state benefits in the future either.
"So the Ricketts administration statement about being a drain on state resources in our opinion was misleading," Omar said.
Ricketts said he's heard differently.
"Well, when the federal government offers to pay, in fact I've talked with some of my colleagues, [the government] offered to pay multiple times the current rate what the current rates in the state are," Ricketts said. "What that means is you're going to displace the current kids in the system. Our current Nebraska kids are going to get displaced out of the system."
According to the legal center, 109 children have been released to family member sponsors in Nebraska over the past five months. The legal center expects placement numbers in the next two years to be similar to those in 2018 when nearly 600 children were released to sponsors across the state.
Regardless of where these children will be temporarily housed Omar said they will eventually be moved to sponsored homes.
"All of these children aren't going to be released into brand new foster homes or things like that," Omar said. "On occasion, that does happen, yes. But, I mean, these children are being released to their families, their family sponsors and in conjunction, other nonprofit resources around town are here to help with the process."