Moffett Field eyed as possible site to house migrant children

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - A NASA site in Mountain View is being considered as a potential location to house thousands of unaccompanied migrant minors.

Officials are considering Moffett Field as a place to house them, NASA officials confirmed. 

Authorities with the US Department of Health and Human Services and NASA's Ames Research Center are checking the vacant property at the former Navy base to see if facilities there could be used as a temporary shelter for the children. 

Some worry, however, if this facility fall in line with the ones used to house migrants in the past.

"It’s a really ironic place to even be offering to house children," says immigration activist, Cynthia Bourjac. Bourjac is the Lead Community Rights Organizer for Causta Justa.

Bourjac says that the naval base may be triggering for the children. 

Immigration activists, like Bourjac, say that they hope the Biden Administration focuses on delivering on their promises to handle immigration policy humanely. 

"We want to do better for our children and will do better in the future," Bourjac says. 

Reports of unsanitary conditions and coronavirus spread are just a few of the concerns activists have about the detention centers.

At the border, a record number of migrant youths are waiting in adult detention cells for longer than allowed.

Nearly 10,000 children were detained while arriving alone at the U.S.-Mexico border in February, Customs and Border Patrol said Wednesday.

Both the number of children and families crossing the border and children crossing on their own has increased this year as more migrants cross the border.

The Biden administration continues to scramble to turn solutions into action. Among the president's major proposals is a legislation that would create an 8-year path to citizenship for roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants in the country.

"We've seen surges before," said Roberta Jacobson, White House coordinator for the southern border. "Surges tend to respond to hope. And there was a significant hope for a more humane policy after four years of you know, pent-up demand. So I don't know whether I would call that a coincidence, but I certainly think that the idea that a more humane policy would be in place may have driven people to make that decision." 

Biden officials have presented solutions aimed at addressing the long-term root cause of migration rather than the current emergency at the border channeling $4 billion into development and aid and job creation programs for El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.

The administration also plans to restore the Central American minors program.   

Biden officials have urged migrants not to travel to the border, telling asylum seekers they need more time to rebuild the system.