Termination of Parental Rights (TPR)

Because so many immigration benefits depend on familial relationships, severing the parent-child relationship has consequences for parents and children.

Adoption and Safe Families Act (ASFA)

• N.Y. Social Services Law 384-b allows for an exception to the ASFA requirement that Social Services file a TPR petition when a child has been in foster care for 15 out of the past 22 months if the parent has been held in immigration detention and maintains a meaningful role in her child’s life.
• Immigration detention does not provide the basis to deprive a family member from meaningful access to a family court proceeding.