Maybe incentivizing parents to send their children over the border with the cartels so the kids can be sex trafficked and abused in shelters isn't the most compassionate policy.
Who knew??
The Justice Department has sued Southwest Key Programs, the nation's largest operator of shelters for unaccompanied migrant children, accusing its employees of repeatedly subjecting minors in its care to sexual abuse and harassment.
Employees at Southwest Key, a nonprofit based in Austin, 'exploited the children's vulnerabilities, language barriers and distance from family and loved ones,' according to the lawsuit, filed in federal court in Texas on Wednesday. From 2015 to at least 2023, children and teenagers at its shelters faced threats of violence intended to prevent them from reporting rape, solicitations of sex and entreaties for nude photographs, among other inappropriate conduct and abuse.
Southwest Key is "one of the largest, Latino-led nonprofit organizations in the United States," it says on its website. For nearly four decades it "has been on the frontline of social justice, youth advocacy, and immigration," including "youth and family services" and "unaccompanied children's programs."
In a press release on Thursday, the DOJ said the nonprofit "operates 29 shelters that provide temporary housing for unaccompanied children in Texas, Arizona and California." The suit alleges that "multiple Southwest Key employees subjected children in their care to severe or pervasive sexual harassment" including "sexual contact and inappropriate touching, solicitation of sex acts, solicitation of nude photos, entreaties for inappropriate relationships and sexual comments."
The detailed abuse is horrific:
By one account, a worker who sexually abused three girls ages 5, 8 and 11 threatened to kill their families if they told. In another instance documented by Southwest Key, a supervisor deliberately changed shifts to be alone with a teenage girl he repeatedly raped, abused and threatened. At night, he would enter her bedroom and those of others in violation of Southwest Key's policies. The girl was transferred to a different shelter after she reported the abuse.
This isn't the first time this business has been under fire: In 2018, "two of its workers were charged with sexually assaulting minors at Arizona facilities," while video evidence emerged of physical abuse at some shelters in Arizona.
Southwest Key "paid a $73,000 fine and lost licenses for two shelters."
As the New York Times drily notes, "caring for migrant children in federal custody is a lucrative, billion-dollar business with little transparency." Lots of money, access to children and little oversight:
Should we be that surprised that this industry attracts some of the worst types of people?
If you want the sex abuse of kids to stop, you might want to think about your vote in November.
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