McALLEN, Texas — A small law firm with ties to the Trump administration declined a $150 million contract to represent migrant children who traveled alone to the U.S., authorities said Wednesday, while another group whose former chief executive was dogged by allegations of misconduct was awarded work worth up to $244 million to advocate for them.
The rapid-fire developments came amid long-term questions about who will represent children in court amid President Donald Trump's push for mass deportations.
The administration last week announced plans to award the contract to the Burke Law Group, a Houston-based firm with little experience in immigration. The contract offer came after the administration let a key contract expire with nearly 100 providers through Acacia Center for Justice.
Unaccompanied migrant children in federal custody are being temporarily represented by another group, but it is unclear how things will shake out after its contract expires in December. A statement from the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement, which oversees the contracts, offered no insight into why Burke declined the offer.
“Burke Law Group has declined to apply and has not been awarded any grant," the agency, which is part of the Department of Health and Human Services, said in an emailed statement in response to a query about the contract.
Burke Law Group published a short statement on social media Tuesday night saying it had considered applying for a “small portion” of the contract. It did not explain why it decided against it.
Burke Law Group's founder, Marcella Burke, served in President Donald Trump’s first administration as a lawyer with the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of the Interior.
Others on its roster include Justin Shubow, a supporter of Trump’s efforts to require federal buildings to adhere to classical and traditional architectural styles, and a former Trump appointee to the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts. Prominent conservative legal scholar Ilya Shapiro is listed as senior counsel.
The administration awarded another contract worth up to $244 million to Our Rescue, an anti-child-trafficking organization based in Sandy, Utah. The group, previously called Operation Underground Railroad, was made famous by the 2023 movie “Sound of Freedom.”
Founder Tim Ballard resigned in 2023 amid allegations of misconduct. Women accused him in lawsuits of exploiting his position at Operation Underground Railroad and their desire to help combat child trafficking to abuse them.
Derek Benner, Our Rescue's current CEO, welcomed the new assignment.
“These are among the most vulnerable children in the world, and they deserve nothing less than the full weight of our experience,” said Benner, a former senior official at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Migrant children who are detained after entering the U.S. without their parents are usually entrusted to federal government care. Congress created various legal protections for them, including the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008, which requires the government to provide legal representation for children put into deportation proceedings.
About 1,800 children were living in shelters and roughly 22,000 facing deportation were living with outside sponsors such as family members, according to the legal service providers whose contract expired.
The Burke Law Group, with fewer than 30 lawyers and only two with relevant immigration experience listed on its website, was one of two groups tapped by the government to fill in the gap.
A temporary contract for $20 million was awarded through the end of the year to the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, a legal aid group whose previous work with the government involved helping resettle Afrikaners.
Attorneys with USCRI started showing up in immigration court last week, unannounced, claiming to represent children they had not yet met and sparking confusion among judges and lawyers from the expired contract still providing representation.
Some legal aid providers whose contracts expired sued the administration after they went without payment since last year. On Aug. 6, a California federal judge ordered the federal government to pay the providers.
“These half-baked plans are not sufficient to comply with this court’s order,” Caelin Moriarity Miltko, an attorney representing the providers, told the judge last week, referring to the interim contracts the government is trying to set up.
“Plaintiffs have ethical obligations to the children they represent today, to continue providing that representation to the best of their abilities, and that representation cannot transfer instantaneously to a new group simply because defendants have changed the contract,” Miltko said.
Bilal Askaryar, director of communications at Acacia Center for Justice, the organization that handled the expired contract with the government, confirmed on Wednesday that the groups started to receive payments covering six out of nine months owed, with the rest in progress.
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