The Trump administration locates more than 22,000 migrant children missing

Fox News had exclusive access to the team responsible for locating the tens of thousands of unaccompanied children who crossed the border and disappeared in the system under the Biden administration.

Under the Trump administration, 22,638 unaccompanied children have been located so far, and more than 400 sponsors have been arrested. Twenty-seven of the minors were found dead, either by murder, suicide or drug overdose, according to the Ministry of Health and Social Services (HHS.)

“It is important that we find these cases where children are used for work and sexual trafficking,” said John Fabbricatore, HHS refugee resettlement office.

The team was brought together in March to make one of President Donald Trump’s campaign promises. He instructed the TSAR of the Tom Homan border to find non -recorded children, many of whom had been released to unparalleled sponsors or non -family members, leaving them vulnerable to the exploitation, trafficking and severe working conditions.

The former ice chief tortures the inadmissible policies of the Biden era while Trump’s DHS finds migrant children

Unaccompanied minor minors are waiting to be transported by the American border patrol after crossing the Rio Grande in the United States from Mexico at Joya, Texas, April 7, 2021. (Reuters / Go Nakamura)

Operating under HHS, the team is made up of volunteers from various agencies, including FBI and internal security surveys. They are working on what is called the “War Hall”, in Washington, DC, officially called the Coordination Cell of the Orr intergence crime.

According to Fabbricatore, many minors that the team was able to locate were found in deplorable and exploited conditions.

“We have found raped children,” he said. “We are talking about debt slavery, where children are made to resolve debt, traffic debt. We are talking about children who have been brought in situations and then treated like sex slaves. You know, where children are in horrible environments, just environments in which they should not be in heroin overdose.”

At the beginning of 2021, a record number of children began to cross the border faster than the HHS could treat. Between January 2021 and December 2024, Orr received more than 470,000 references of unaccompanied foreign children who crossed the border.

According to HHS, many of these children have been released in sponsors in the context of very lax verification policies which have not guaranteed the safety of children or to prevent multiple cases of endangerment of children, in particular negligence, exploitation of work, trafficking and sexual and physical abuse.

The new team is focused on the data, focusing on the analysis of recordings and addresses to follow where these minors finally met.

The Biden team has left thousands of migrant children with largely unsuitable sponsors, reveal the files

Unaccompanied migrant children are seen on the left because they are recorded alongside other asylum research migrants that have crossed the Rio Grande in the United States from Mexico in Roma, Texas, on May 14, 2022. (Reuters / Latif))

“There was no very good file of files” under the Biden administration, said Fabbricatore. “It makes this data able to identify the addresses, where these children have gone, that these sponsors were really. In many cases, that the data is, is horrible. What the Biden administration took and put in our computer systems was not the right information. So now, we must shoot all that and invest deeply in the place where some of these children have been.”

According to Fabbricatore, the most worrying lance in screening was not to make DNA tests to confirm that children were released to family members.

The Trump administration has taken measures to improve the process of checking children who arrive in the United States alone, ensuring that sponsors – generally parents or tutors – are properly detected. These measures include the requirement of DNA tests, proof of income to demonstrate the ability to take care of the child, the verification of criminal history, fingerprints and identification verification.

“So now, under this administration, we make sure that we know that there is a real family bond via DNA, and we do not publish these children unless we have the right information,” said Fabbricatore. “Children stay in detention longer, but there is a reason for this, because we want to make sure that these children remain safe.”

When the Trump administration took office, there was a backlog of more than 65,000 untreated post-liberation reports, called concern notifications, according to Orr. These internal reports concern unaccompanied foreign children and include allegations ranging from administrative problems to potential traffic and criminal exploitation.

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The chained migrants embark on a transport van after leaving a plane at Valley International Airport on Sunday August 31, 2025, in Harlingen, Texas. (AP photo / Michael Gonzalez)

The administration has identified approximately 1,700 cases where children under the age of 12 were placed with unrelated sponsors without proof of a home study, according to Orr.

From the backwards, Orr examined around 90%, leaving less than 7,000 reports still pending.

When children are located, said Fabbricatore, the goal is to bring them together with their parents if they are in another country and there is no credible fear complaint.

“If their parents are in a previous country and there is no credible fear complaint, isn’t it better that a child is with his parents or in our family investment system here in the United States?” Said Fabbricatore. “I would say that we should not take care of them here in the United States when they have families in their country of origin. And if we can prove that they are safer in the country, they return, this is where they should be with their parents.”