Judge considers ban on separating families at border

SAN DIEGO (AP) — A federal judge will consider arguments to prohibit U.S. immigration authorities from separating parents from their children at the border in a lawsuit on behalf of a Congolese woman who was separated from her 7-year-old daughter for five months after claiming asylum at a San Diego border crossing.

The mother, identified in court documents as Mrs. L, claimed asylum at San Diego’s San Ysidro border crossing on Nov. 1 and, four days later, was separated from her daughter. The girl, then 6, was sent to a Chicago shelter overseen by the U.S. Health and Human Services Department’s Office of Refugee Resettlement, while the mother was held at a San Diego immigration detention facility until March 6.

The case seeks to halt family separation while the lawsuit proceeds through federal court.