Separated from their parents, they have math and English classes; It is forbidden to cry and touch other children Behave. Do not sit on the floor. Do not share your food. Do not use nicknames. And you'd better not cry. If you cry, this can hurt your process.
The lights are turned off at 9:00 p.m. and turned on at dawn, and after that you have to pack your bed following the step-by-step instructions attached to the wall.
Wash the bathroom and rag on the floor, brush the sinks and private. After that it's time to line up for breakfast. "We had to queue for everything," recalled Leticia, a Guatemalan girl.
Small, thin and with long black hair, Leticia was separated from her mother after they had crossed the border illegally at the end of May. She was sent to a shelter in South Texas, one of more than 100 detention centers commissioned by the government to house migrant children scattered across the country and who are a mix of inner-school, daycare, and middle-security prisons. These centers are reserved for people like Leticia, 12, and her brother Walter, 10.
The center's bans list included the following: Do not touch another child, even if that child is your little brother or little sister. Leticia wanted to give her younger brother a hug, to make him more relaxed. But, he recalled, "I was told I could not touch him."
In response to reactions of international outrage, President Donald Trump recently issued an executive order to end the practice of his administration, largely adopted in May, to forcibly remove children from their migrant parents who had entered the country illegally.
