Law & Policy

To examine the Indian Child Welfare Act and its impact, The Imprint reviewed summaries of 40 cases handled last fall by a leading nonprofit law firm in Minnesota, where Native American children are removed from their parents at a rate unseen elsewhere in the country. The review revealed that the federal law has a clear benefit for the children it is designed to protect — and without it, those rights would be greatly diminished.

New York has become the 16th state to legalize recreational marijuana. And the new law makes clear that parents should not be judged for using it.

A federal judge on Sunday threw out a Trump Administration proposal that would have cut food stamps to 700,000 Americans, including many foster youths aging out of care, at the end of the coronavirus emergency, which has put millions out of work.

The coronavirus pandemic has added urgency to the work of this year’s class of congressional interns with expertise in foster care – the history of their own lives. The fallout of COVID-19 has hit more than 400,000 children and youth in foster care like few other groups of Americans as yet another trauma in their lives, and none more so than young people approaching independence.

Two weeks ago, U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols drew a line in the sand. The U.S. government had issued a directive requiring border agents to deport unaccompanied children, arguing that they could be vectors and contributing to the spread of COVID-19.

After earlier pleas to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) went unanswered, advocates for young adults in foster care are urging support for legislation that would extend housing and financial support beyond the current age limit of 21 during the coronavirus pandemic.

Comparing the threat of coronavirus to fire tearing through a house, a federal judge on Friday ordered Immigration and Customs Enforcement to release minors who have been held in family detention facilities for more than 20 days by July 17.

In December 2015, a federal judge ruled that Texas was violating the rights of children in long-term care of the state by subjecting them to abuse, overmedication and repeated placement moves.