Two years ago, when the number of unaccompanied minors apprehended at the border reached crisis levels and overwhelmed existing housing options, the government opened temporary emergency shelters at three military bases.
Since then, officials have considered using military bases as potential spaces to temporarily house the unaccompanied minors if they run out of beds elsewhere. Also in that time, Republicans have argued that providing even short-term shelter for children at military bases is wrong, partly because the minors shouldn't be in the U.S. in the first place.
Those Republicans won on Thursday, when the House of Representatives voted to block the military from temporarily housing unaccompanied minors on military bases through two amendments to the Department of Defense Appropriations Act.
Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), who authored one of the amendments, said Thursday that President Barack Obama had "put out the welcome mat" to encourage Central Americans to come to the U.S. without authorization. The government seemed to insist it has responsibility "for everybody on the planet that the president has sympathy for," he added.
"Our military should not be used to inappropriately house and be part of the welcome party that the president has set up that's encouraging people to come into the United States illegally," King said on the House floor ahead of the vote.
Rep. Bradley Byrne (R-Ala.), who offered the other amendment that passed Thursday, tweeted afterward that he hoped it would keep unaccompanied minors from being temporarily placed in his district, something the government reportedly has been considering.
The congressman said on the House floor Wednesday that the Department of Health and Human Services, which is tasked with caring for unaccompanied minor immigrants, was refusing to do its job by using shelters near the border, and instead burdening the Department of Defense.
A Baldwin County commissioner told HHS earlier this week that the county did not want unaccompanied children in shelters there.
"I don't want to be rude but ... you're not welcome," Commissioner Chris Elliott said. "We are not interested in having these facilities here."
Central American minors who cross the border without their parents go into the custody of HHS, which then seeks to place them either with family members or in foster care as they go through deportation proceedings.
HHS is currently operating a temporary shelter for unaccompanied minors at a Department of Labor property in Florida, according to a spokeswoman. If more beds were needed, though, HHS could reopen a shelter at the Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico.
The government has apprehended nearly 33,000 unaccompanied minors at the border so far this fiscal year.
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