The Department of Homeland Security and the Justice Department held a joint briefing to describe ongoing efforts to locate thousands of unaccompanied minors who vanished during the Biden years, to name the failures, and to promise accountability for those responsible.
At the press conference, DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin laid out a grim picture of what investigators have uncovered and framed the hunt for missing children as a law-and-order priority. He said investigators found not only gaps in custody and record-keeping but reports of horrific abuse inflicted on some of the missing children. Mullin also criticized actions during the prior administration that, he argued, hindered enforcement efforts and resource continuity.
Secretary Mullin told reporters that the recovery effort has reversed a lot of the neglect that left so many kids unaccounted for, and he cited large numbers to show progress. “These individuals [DHS agents] – that the Democrats seem to want to defund, but because of President Trump we finally funded them from three years – were able to push and go find these kids,” Sec. Mullin said. “We found 146,000 kids so far. We still have nearly 300,000 missing.”
He did not soften the claims about what happened to some of those children while they were missing, using blunt language to describe survivor accounts. “We’re investigating reports…where some of these kids claim that they were raped 6-700 times.” Those words underscore the human stakes behind the numbers and the urgency the new team says they feel to bring perpetrators to justice.
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The press conference also targeted political decisions that affected border security, with officials arguing that policy choices and funding disputes left enforcement stretched thin. Mullin pointed out that a partial government shutdown had stripped capacity from frontline agents, particularly Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. From his perspective, restoring funding and authority was essential to enabling investigations and rescues at scale.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche described the Justice Department’s parallel work to hold traffickers and smugglers accountable as part of the broader recovery and cleanup effort. He emphasized prosecutions and casework aimed at networks who exploit children and at sponsors who conceal illicit activity. Blanche made a point of linking border failures to harm to vulnerable people, arguing enforcement is a moral necessity as well as a legal one.
At the podium Blanche said that indictments are already in play against those who conspired to smuggle children, and he highlighted a category of cases the department has flagged for special attention. The statement released alongside his remarks said, “.@DAGToddBlanche announces the indictments of 3 illegal aliens who took part in a wide-ranging conspiracy to smuggle more than a dozen children into the United States.” It also noted, “There are over 15,500 ‘super sponsor’ cases that we have identified.” That line was used to underline both the scale and the pattern of criminality the DOJ is pursuing.
“I think I’m stating the obvious,” Blanche said, “that when government fails to protect our borders, it is the most vulnerable who suffer.” His comments framed the DOJ response as a direct correction to the laxity he attributes to the prior administration’s policies. He reiterated the department’s stated “zero tolerance for unlawful activity” and commitment to protecting children who were harmed.
The officials described a series of operational results and promised continued work to close the gaps that allowed children to disappear from view. They credited renewed funding and targeted investigations with enabling rescues and prosecutions that were not happening at the same scale before. Sources across the briefing repeatedly tied operational gains to restored resources and to a sustained focus on enforcement.
Reporting from late 2025 and early 2026 had already signaled that recovery efforts were ramping up, and the administration used those earlier findings to bolster its case for aggressive follow-through. Border leadership claimed large numbers of rescues and recoveries in recent months, and those figures were presented as evidence that a renewed federal focus can produce results quickly. Officials insisted that the work is far from finished and pledged to continue identifying sponsors, suspects, and cases that remain unresolved.
Throughout the event, the tone mixed urgency with accountability: officials cast the situation as a consequence of prior policy failures, and they framed their work as the sober business of fixing a crisis and prosecuting criminals. They emphasized practical steps—investigations, indictments, rescues—rather than rhetoric, while repeatedly pointing to the numbers behind the claims. The administration stressed that restoring capability and enforcing the law are the closest things to a solution when children are at risk.
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