Stephen Miller Pushes to Speed Removal of Migrant Children

Stephen Miller is leading a White House effort to accelerate the removal of migrant children from the United States, coordinating multiple federal agencies in a push that critics describe as cruel and racist.

The reporting comes from The Guardian, which says Miller, a deputy chief of staff focused on immigration policy, is personally directing a coordinated drive across at least five cabinet-level departments. Those agencies include Health and Human Services, which oversees unaccompanied migrant children; Homeland Security, home to ICE and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; the Justice Department, which runs the immigration courts; and the State Department and Pentagon in supporting roles.

Almost 200,000 children have been ordered removed from the U.S. by immigration judges since President Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, according to an analysis of Department of Justice data conducted by the advocacy group Mobile Pathways and shared with The Guardian. That is a doubling of such court orders since January 2025.

Sources familiar with the White House plans told The Guardian that Miller frequently confers with subordinates, at times daily, pressing them to maximize removals of immigrant children from the U.S. One source said agency staff are informed that instructions came directly from the White House or directly from Stephen Miller to underscore urgency.

The White House did not deny that Miller is orchestrating a multi-agency effort to speed up the removal of undocumented children but claimed the effort was not new.

Critics, including some internal sources who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation, describe the initiative as cruel and racist, with tactics that in some cases flout federal law. They warn of the White House pushing each department to boost efforts individually and by working together in new ways to speed up and expand the deportation of undocumented children.

Those tactics, according to sources, include dismantling inter-agency communication safeguards designed to protect children, and hurrying them in vast numbers, without lawyers, in front of asylum officers and immigration judges who are either inclined or are under pressure to take a hard line and get them out of the U.S. One source told The Guardian that ICE officers are now stationed at sponsorship appointments to detain relatives just before or after a child’s release. Another described rushed virtual asylum interviews without adequate legal prep.

I read this and feel a quiet worry that does not need volume to be real. Accelerating the removal of children raises humanitarian concerns that sit heavy even when the language around them stays dry.

There is separate reporting that adds context to the broader enforcement push. KFF Health News, republished by CBS News on September 9, 2026, reported that an estimated 205,000 children had at least one parent detained by immigration authorities through April 2026, a number the outlet says has almost certainly grown since.

And in Chicago, elected officials and advocates raised alarm in late August about due process violations targeting children at the immigration court there. They said hundreds of children nationally have been scheduled for expedited hearings with little notice in recent months, as the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda has increasingly targeted children. Throughout 2026, the average time in custody at government shelters for immigrant youth has skyrocketed, they said, while court hearings for these youth have dramatically accelerated.

The White House has also been securing agreements with other countries to facilitate deportations. The Washington Post reported on September 21 that the Trump administration has authorized or pledged at least $410 million to facilitate agreements with 31 countries, mostly in Africa and Latin America, as of the end of June, according to internal government records. The Post said those agreements have been secured under the orders of Stephen Miller.

At the same time, a federal appeals court recently ruled that the Trump administration’s policy of deporting immigrants to third countries where they are not nationals is unlawful under the Administrative Procedure Act. The First Circuit held that the Department of Homeland Security must provide effective notice and a meaningful opportunity to raise fears of persecution or torture before carrying out such a removal. The policy authorized third-country removals without effective notice or a meaningful opportunity for affected people to make those claims, the court found.

I do not know what will happen next in court or in the shelters where children wait. I do know that when the machinery of removal speeds up, the margin for error shrinks, and the people least able to absorb mistakes feel it first.

Florida Representative María Elvira Salazar, a Republican, warned Trump on September 20 that advisers are compromising his legacy and not showing the whole picture. Asked by Face the Nation whether she were referring to Tom Homan, Trump’s border czar, or Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff who has spearheaded the removal of undocumented children, Salazar placed the onus on Trump.

The administration has not offered an on-record rebuttal to the reporting about Miller’s multi-agency drive, leaving real due-process and child-welfare questions unanswered alongside legitimate enforcement goals.

I keep coming back to the number that does not move: almost 200,000 children ordered removed since January 2025. Behind that figure are hearings scheduled with little notice, relatives detained at sponsorship appointments, and virtual interviews rushed without adequate legal preparation, according to sources.

That is the part that stays with me after I set the article down. Not the label critics use, though I understand why they reach for strong words. The part that stays is the pace, and what pace does to people who cannot slow it down.

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