US orders emergency agency to help with child migrant surge

The Biden administration ordered the government's disaster emergency agency  Saturday to help with a surge in migrant children crossing the southern border that has overwhelmed processing facilities.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas called upon the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to support an effort to temporarily house thousands of children who crossed the US-Mexico border alone amid criticisms that authorities were holding them for long periods in overcrowded facilities.

The Health and Human Services (HHS) department is currently holding about 8,800 migrant children and the US Customs and Border Protection has hundreds more in their charge, with more arriving every day.

In February alone CBP detained 9,457 unaccompanied migrant children at the southern border.