The Biden administration failed to investigate more than 7,300 reports of human trafficking involving child migrants and tens of thousands of other concerning leads, startling findings from the Department of Health and Human Services released Thursday show.
HHS is poring over 65,605 backlogged reports from the last administration as part of an interagency probe into cases of unaccompanied migrant kids who may have been abused by sex predators or trafficked by gangs like MS-13.
Since launching the investigation in February, the department has processed 18,868 cases — but still has 1,688 of possibly fraudulent sponsors receiving the kids, 7,346 human trafficking reports and another 46,311 other tips from grantees, staff and unaccompanied minors themselves to vet.
So far that’s led to 528 investigative leads, 36 prosecutions taken up by US attorneys’ offices, 25 arrest warrants, 11 arrests, seven indictments and three convictions — with roughly 28% of the backlog worked through under President Trump.
“This is a systemic failure of the Biden administration. It is children’s lives put at risk,” reps for HHS said in an April 22 statement.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) published the HHS statistics in a letter sent to Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Tuesday, asking for “an immediate update on governmentwide efforts to find and rescue children who were placed in harm’s way.”
“My oversight exposed the Biden-Harris administration for placing unaccompanied migrant children with dangerous sponsors and actively obstructing law enforcement and Congress’ efforts to rescue vulnerable kids,” Grassley said in a statement.
“I applaud the Trump administration for its swift action to protect unaccompanied migrant children by addressing the concerning reports the Biden-Harris administration shelved. I look forward to working with Secretary Kennedy to ensure justice is served.” --->READ MORE HERE
Government employees and contractors who cared for unaccompanied immigrant children in government custody after they crossed the southern border flagged more than 65,000 instances of concern that went unaddressed by the Biden administration, according to newly released materials.
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) documents obtained by Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and shared exclusively with the Washington Examiner revealed that the Trump administration identified a backlog of 65,000 reports filed by workers about children in custody or their sponsors who warranted concern.
Those concerns were not investigated by the Biden administration, as the HHS prioritized the expeditious release of children to sponsors amid the influx of children arriving daily at the border over four years.
The 65,000 flagged cases were not addressed before children were released to adults in the United States between 2021 and 2024, an issue that Grassley is pushing the Trump administration to investigate thoroughly.
“Not a single child should continue to suffer because of the previous administration’s failures,” Grassley wrote in a letter sent to Trump’s HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., on Tuesday.
More than 500,000 children crossed the U.S.-Mexico border unaccompanied under the Biden administration, far exceeding any other previous administration’s totals.
Children were initially encountered at the border by Border Patrol agents, then turned over to HHS, which maintains care settings more suitable for children. HHS is also responsible for finding an adult in the U.S. to release the child to.
As they interviewed children and looked into applications of adult sponsors, HHS workers and contractors flagged countless cases as being of concern. --->READ MORE HERE
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