U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement began distributing a form in all three of its family detention centers on Thursday that would allow parents to apply for their minor children to be released. Advocates say parents may be persuaded to separate from their children if they are worried about exposing them to COVID-19 and that ICE is using it to show that these parents have chosen to keep their children in detention. A court agreement prohibits ICE from holding minors for more than 20 days.

The Trump administration faced intense criticism in 2018 for a zero tolerance policy, in which undocumented migrant children were separated from parents who had illegally crossed the border.