A pair of Republican senators are demanding that federal officials account for how they reportedly lost track of 85,000 migrant children over the past two years.
The clamor from Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) comes on the heels of a February New York Times report that the Department of Health and Human Services had been unable to contact thousands of unaccompanied minors who were placed with sponsors after crossing the border — raising fears that they have been trafficked for cheap labor.
“The FBI must mount a full-scale effort to locate these missing children and to bring to justice the criminals who are holding them in modern-day slavery,” Hawley wrote in his Thursday missive to bureau Director Christopher Wray.
Calling the Biden administration “morally responsible” for the situation, Hawley demanded the FBI investigate both HHS and the Department of Homeland Security for allegedly turning a blind eye to whistleblowers, writing, “The FBI must also investigate HHS and the Department of Homeland Security for their role in facilitating the exploitation of these children, in violation of the law.”
In a separate letter to HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra, Blackburn said she was “deeply concerned” over the situation and asked Becerra to say when he learned “of the mishandling and exploitation” of children whose well-being the department is meant to monitor.
Caseworkers who spoke with the Times estimated that up to two-thirds of unaccompanied child border crossers wound up employed full-time — and claimed that HHS ignored signs that kids were being exploited.
The White House announced last week that Susan Rice, President Biden’s top domestic policy adviser, would be leaving her position after a follow-up report by the Times last week indicated she had ignored concerns related to migrants being forced to work.
Roughly 340,000 unaccompanied children have shown up at the United States border since 2021, according to US Customs and Border Protection.
