Newly declared presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz says the Department of Health and Human Services is ignoring
thousands of allegations involving unaccompanied immigrant children who were sneaked into the country illegally last year.
In a
letter Wednesday to the department, the Texas Republican says there's been no prosecution of cases that include alleged sexual abuse or violence.
"Information exists that indicates the department has been and is aware of these incidents but has chosen not to address them, or to not address them in any meaningful way," Cruz writes.
He also accuses the department of keeping incident reports for internal use, "and that there may be tens of thousands of these reports" – some involving abuse or violence to the children – "that have yet to even be reviewed, much less investigated."
Cruz asked HHS to preserve all related documents since 2009.
"These problems appear to be serious and ongoing, and require the immediate attention of both the Department and Congress," he writes.
Cruz last July spoke about the problem, calling it a "direct consequence of President Obama's lawlessness" in a radio interview with
The Right Scoop.
At that time, he said children were "being handed over not to well-meaning social workers but to hardened transnational global criminal cartels who are physically assaulting these kids, sexually assaulting these kids."
More than 60,000 minors crossed into the U.S. in 2013 alone,
The Hill reports.
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