Parents who are paying cartels to bring their children into the country illegally could soon be facing arrest, according to McClatchyDC . Human traffickers often exploit the children in what is a very dangerous journey. Many of these children end up being sexually molested and exploited in other ways. It’s not worth the risk.

If we want to keep families together, the better way is to send the parents home.

One must wonder why child abuse hasn’t been considered before this. Stopping the traffickers also involves stopping the people who fund them. In this case, the parents.

It is common for parents who are in the U.S. illegally to pay human smugglers to arrange for their children to be brought to the United States and dropped off at the border.

Unaccompanied children are turned over to the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement, which will either care for them in a shelter or release them to a family member, usually someone also here illegally.

Currently, as opposed to the last eight years, U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents are sharing information with immigration agents about U.S.-based relatives of unaccompanied children. That will be used to track down the parents.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials confirmed last Thursday the initiative to “disrupt and dismantle” human-smuggling facilitators. That will include the people who pay to have them smuggled.

“ICE aims to disrupt and dismantle end-to-end the illicit pathways used by transnational criminal organizations and human smuggling facilitators,” said Jennifer Elzea, deputy press secretary for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. “As such, we are currently conducting a surge initiative focused on the identification and arrest of individuals involved in illicit human smuggling operations, to include sponsors who have paid criminal organizations to smuggle children into the United States,” ABC News reported.

Unaccompanied minors will no longer be protected from deportation. Many are teens with ties to gangs or who will be easily susceptible to recruitment.

In February, Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly expanded detention and deportation orders and included unaccompanied children.

“The surge of illegal immigration at the southern border has overwhelmed federal agencies and resources and has created a significant national security vulnerability to the United States,” Kelly wrote in the memorandums, copies of which were first published by McClatchy.

The administration is focusing on criminal aliens but will detain others they come across in the process.

Illegal aliens are afraid

Illegal aliens are fearful, especially of being separated from family. ICE Director Tom Homan addressed that Wednesday, saying they shouldn’t feel comfortable. As for families being separated, Homan said the parents put themselves in that position when they come to the United States illegally.

“Look, if we don’t have border security, if we don’t enforce the laws written in the books, you’re never going to control the border,” Homan said. “Why do you think we got 11 million to 12 million people in this country now? Because there has been this notion that if you get by the Border Patrol, you get in the United States, you have a U.S. citizen kid, no one is looking for you. But those days are over.”

The left says it’s immoral to deport. Activists say it’s “cruel beyond measure” to arrest sponsors who pay human traffickers.

However, and people might have forgotten, t’s illegal to fund and support traffickers.

The U.S. wants to be global leaders in the fight against human trafficking but what good is it if we don’t try to stop it here at home?