Lawyers in Texas were enraged. They demanded the government give a 10-year-old girl with a rare disease back to her family.
Rosa Maria Hernandez is a 10-year-old girl with cerebral palsy, who was detained by the state after an emergency surgery. She’s undocumented in the US, as are her parents. However, Rosa, her mother, and her father have all been living together in Texas for ten years now. That’s essentially Rosa’s entire life.
Rosa struggles with physical and cognitive challenges, due to her condition. Cerebral palsy is a neurological disorder caused by damage in a child’s brain early on– usually before birth or shortly after. This leads to a lack of muscle coordination or control, to varying extents. Some patients are able to walk, and have no intellectual disabilities. Other patients have a hard time in one or both of those areas. There are some medicines that relieve the muscle tightness many patients experience, as well as anti-seizure medication. However, there is no cure. To learn more about this rare disease, click here.
Rosa’s parents knew there was a risk when they sent her for medical treatment, especially considering that going to the hospital meant passing a federal immigration check point. Still, Rosa needed emergency surgery to remove her gall bladder, so they didn’t have a choice. They sent her with a cousin who had U.S. citizenship, to be safe.
However, when Rosa’s surgery was over, Border Patrol agents took her into custody. They found her at the check point, trailed her to the hospital, and then waited for her surgery to be over. Rosa was held in a government children’s shelter. She was recovering under the care of adults she doesn’t know, while her parents, who know how to care for her rare disease, were not allowed to have her back. This was her first time away from her parents and home, and her lawyers reported that she was confused. The government was in the process of trying to deport her.
Many people have criticized Border Patrol for this incident. Agents, such as Gabriel Acosta, say they did what they had to do. There’s a law that’s been around for ten years, that outline how to handle coming across and Unaccompanied Alien Child (UAC). Most of the time, this law deals with children who traveled across the Texas border alone. It’s unusual to have a case where they take a child who has lived with their parents in the US for most of their life.
Acosta didn’t immediately realize that was the situation. He just knew that her cousin was neither her parent, nor guardian. At that point, they had to make sure this wasn’t an incident of child trafficking. After they understood the situation, they came with her to the hospital.
Acosta also said that the well-being of all unaccompanied children Border Patrol encounters must be considered. Rosa’s lawyer, Leticia Gonzalez, thinks this contradicts their actions. In a medically sensitive case like Rosa’s, the shelter was far from being in her best interest. Lawyers also object to the idea that Rosa was “unaccompanied.” Even if her parents weren’t physically there, they were present in arranging her hospital trip, and have never faltered in their care.
Rosa’s parents applied to be her sponsors to that she can come home. The process generally takes months, but because of the special circumstances, HHS made this case a priority. She has since been released, and you can read more about that here.
