In light of the government’s inability to locate about 85,000 migrant children who were let into the country by former President Joe Biden, Missouri Senator Josh Hawley has requested that FBI Director Chris Wray launch a full-scale probe into the matter.
In a House Judiciary subcommittee hearing on Wednesday, whistleblower and former HHS employee Tara Lee Rodas testified that the United States government had become a “middleman” in a multibillion dollar operation to traffic migrants at the southern border. This prompted the letter from Hawley.
Customs and Border Protection figures show that around 345,000 unaccompanied minors had crossed the border since the start of 2021, as stated by Hawley at the outset of his letter. You’ve probably seen in the New York Times that the HHS has lost track of as many as 85,000 migrant children. Thousands of these children are now targets of child labor scammers.
President Joe Biden has been in office for more than two years, and in that time more than 3.5 million illegal immigrants have crossed the southern border. More than 356,000 unaccompanied minors have arrived at the southern border since January 2021. The majority of them were allowed entry into the country.
In his follow-up letter, Hawley said, “Reporting shows that HHS loosened vetting processes for sponsors and punished whistleblowers who raised these concerns.” “Consequently, thousands of children have been sold to modern-day slave traders. They are subjected to abusive factory labor. They are coerced into working as auto component manufacturers, abattoir employees, and roof repairmen. They go hungry, miss out on education opportunities, and are often in danger. They’re being mistreated sexually. This is unacceptable in a nation that prides itself on the rule of law and the protection of its young citizens.
According to Hawley, this issue “clearly violates both the Fair Labor Standards Act, which says that underage workers can’t be mistreated, and the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which makes it a federal crime to traffic people.”
The senator called for a “full-scale” attempt to locate the missing children, apprehend the traffickers involved, and punish the administration officials “for their role in facilitating the exploitation of these children in violation of the law.”