Trump administration keeping underage pregnant migrants in a single Texas shelter where abortion is outlawed: report [View all]

Source: The Independent

Saturday 21 February 2026 10:04 EST


Donald Trump’s administration is concentrating all pregnant children being held in federal immigration enforcement custody into one group shelter in south Texas, a state where abortion is outlawed with no exceptions for survivors of rape or incest.

Since last summer, more than a dozen pregnant minors, some as young as 13 years old, have been moved to a facility in San Benito along the U.S.-Mexico border, according to a joint investigation by The Texas Newsroom and The California Newsroom, citing sources within the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) within the Department of Health and Human Services.

The agency is responsible for children who entered the United States without a parent or legal guardian or who were separated from their families by immigration authorities.

Their detention at the Texas facility deviates from longstanding federal policy, which has typically placed unaccompanied minors into ORR shelters or foster homes that can handle high-risk pregnancies. But legal advocates and care providers fear the administration has concentrated those girls into a poorly equipped Texas shelter, even if they were detained in other states, to ensure they are denied access to abortion care.

Read more: https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/pregnant-migrants-minors-texas-shelter-trump-b2923246.html