US judge blocks Donald Trump’s new rules that would allow migrant children to be detained indefinitely

District Court Judge Dolly Gee said the rules conflict with a 1997 settlement agreement requiring the government to release immigrant children promptly

The Trump administration sought to end the agreement and issued the new rules with the hope of detaining children in facilities with their parents

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Children take part in a protest against US immigration policies outside the US embassy in Mexico City. Photo: AFP

Published: 11:43am, 28 Sep 2019Updated: 11:43am, 28 Sep 2019

A US judge has blocked new rules from the administration of President Donald Trump that would enable the government to keep immigrant children in detention facilities with their parents indefinitely.

US District Court Judge Dolly Gee said in Los Angeles on Friday that the rules conflict with a 1997 settlement agreement that requires the government to release immigrant children caught on the border as quickly as possible to relatives in the US and says they can only be held in facilities licensed by a state.

Gee said the Flores agreement – named for a teenage plaintiff – will remain in place and govern the conditions for all immigrant children in US custody, including those with their parents.

“The agreement has been necessary, relevant, and critical to the public interest in maintaining standards for the detention and release of minors arriving at the United States’ borders,” the judge wrote in her decision.

US District Judge Dolly Gee pictured in 2018. Photo: AP

“Defendants willingly negotiated and bound themselves to these standards for all minors in its custody, and no final regulations or changed circumstances yet merit termination of the Flores agreement.”