The Biden administration is reportedly considering compensating immigrant families that were separated at the U.S. border during the Trump administration up to $450,000 each.
A report from The Wall Street Journal, which cited sources familiar with the matter, revealed that several federal agencies are taking part in the discussions. Sources said the agencies involved include the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and Health and Human Services.
The settlement amounts that are reportedly being discussed are currently somewhere around $1 million per family or about $450,000 per person. This would equate to a total possible payout of around $1 billion. Sources said the figures are still open to change. The lawyers representing the families are seeking at least $3.4 million for each affected family.
The American Civil Liberties Union is representing many families in litigation stemming from the Trump administration's zero-tolerance family separation policy, which began in 2018. Nearly 5,500 children were separated during the previous administration, according to the union.
A task group in the Biden administration recently reunited 52 families who had been separated by the Trump administration, out of a total of over 1,000.
Lawyers representing the families involved in the litigation have submitted roughly 940 claims. The majority of the families claimed that their children were taken from them by immigration officers. They also accused the government of placing their children in facilities where they suffered from heat exhaustion, hunger, and inadequate medical care.
The central issue in many of the lawsuits is the long-term mental health damage caused by being separated from their families and of being held in detention centers by immigration officers.
Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU's immigrant-rights project said even U.S. President Joe Biden has acknowledged that the family separation program is a terrible moral stain on our society that must be thoroughly addressed. He said that apart from the financial compensation, the administration has to provide the families with a means of staying in the country.
The organization and the lawyers representing the families said that expect to achieve an agreement by the end of November. It is not clear if they would be able to get the amount they are seeking for each person or if they would settle on a different amount.
