Photo: @ACLU/Twitter Protesters at La Guardia Airport early on Thursday morning.

New York became a focal point in the controversy over migrant children separated from their parents on Wednesday after local officials revealed that more than 200 of those children have been transferred to facilities in the state. Reports that migrant children were still arriving on flights from Texas drew hundreds to an overnight protest at La Guardia airport that was reminiscent of the demonstrations against President Trump’s travel ban.

Though Trump signed an executive order on Wednesday afternoon saying families apprehended at the border must be detained together while the adults await prosecution under his “zero tolerance policy,” federal officials said they would make no special effort to reunite the 2,300 children who have already been taken from their families. (Later, officials at the Department of Health and Human Services walked that back slightly, saying they are awaiting further guidance).

In recent days journalists have been trying to determine what’s become of the children transferred to New York after being separated from their families. After receiving a tip that some of the children were being sent to Cayuga Centers, a foster agency in East Harlem, NY1 obtained video of a group of five girls being escorted to the facility at 12:45 a.m. on Wednesday. About an hour later, they left after being walked to a vehicle with coverings over their heads.

EXCLUSIVE: Children from the southern border are being brought to NYC after being separated from their families.

Overnight, @joshrobin captured video of unusual activity at a foster agency in East Harlem. #MorningsOn1 pic.twitter.com/WhiN27wb5T — Spectrum News NY1 (@NY1) June 20, 2018

Hours later, Governor Cuomo confirmed that the girls had been separated from their parents, and children in their situation are being kept in at least ten facilities across the state. He said the federal government has barred the state from providing additional medical or mental-health services for the children. “These children shouldn’t be in facilities in New York or anywhere else in the first place,” he said in a New York Times op-ed. “They should be with their parents.”

Mayor de Blasio held a press conference after visiting the East Harlem facility, saying the federal government would not tell city or state officials exactly how many children had been sent to the region, or where they were being housed. He said 350 separated children had passed through Cayuga Centers, which places children in temporary foster care and runs day programs; 239 were currently in the agency’s care.

“How is it possible that none of us knew that there were 239 kids right here in our own city?” he asked. “How is the federal government holding back that information from the people of this city and holding back the help these kids could need?”

I just visited a facility in New York City caring for children separated from their parents at the southern border. We were told the youngest was just 9 months old. pic.twitter.com/1Z5GYJRoD0 — Mayor Bill de Blasio (@NYCMayor) June 20, 2018

WNYC reported that Cayuga is one of 11 facilities in the New York City area that have taxpayer-funded contracts to accept “unaccompanied alien minors” and place them in group homes or with foster families. The figures below reflect their contracts for the current fiscal year:

Abbott House (Westchester County) — $2.5 million Catholic Guardian Services (New York City) — $7.5 million Cayuga Home for Children (New York City) — $40 million Center for Family Services (Camden, NJ) — $4 million Jewish Child Care Association (New York City) — $2 million Rising Ground (Westchester) — $14.3 million Lincoln Hall (Westchester) — $16.4 million Lutheran Social Services (New York City) — $5 million Mercy First (Long Island) — $5.7 million Children’s Home of Kingston (Ulster County) — $2.1 million Children’s Village (Westchester) — $6.9 million

Immigration and Customs Enforcement can only hold unaccompanied children for 72 hours before they must be transferred to the Office of Refugee Resettlement. The child is then placed in a foster group that contracts with the federal government. Since few beds are available in facilities near the border, the children may be sent to foster groups thousands of miles away from where their parents are detained.

“In theory, you would think that the government would be sending kids to New York who might have a sponsor in the northeast, but that’s not always how it works,” a source told Gothamist. “There doesn’t seem to be a method for this. We get a phone call from ORR and they say, ‘Hey, we’re arriving at JFK. We have three kids with us.’”

Anthony Enriquez, the director of the unaccompanied minors program for Catholic Charities, told the Times that most of the children arriving from the border are under the age of 10, and they don’t know how to locate their parents.

“There is no system whatsoever to track these family separations, no efforts systematically to reunite these families,” Enriquez said. “There is no supervisor, there is no database saying, ‘child here, parent there,’ so they can come back together.”

On Wednesday night, the Times posted video of seven boys carrying government-labeled belongings arriving at La Guardia on an American Airlines flight from Dallas–Fort Worth International Airport. Police escorted them to a van with tinted windows.

Earlier in the day, the airline issued a statement asking the federal government to stop using their flights to transport children taken from their parents, saying they have “no desire to be associated with separating families, or worse, to profit from it.” A spokesman for the airline told the New York Times that the seven boys were apprehended at the border without their parents, but flight attendants seemed to doubt that:

An American Airlines spokesman, Ross Feinstein, said in an interview that it had delayed the flight from Dallas-Fort Worth by 33 minutes until it got reassurances from government officials that these teenagers were not among those who had been separated from their parents. But a cluster of flight attendants who had been on board stood nearby after the children deplaned, visibly distraught. “They lied to us,” one flight attendant said.

Immigration advocates posted photos and videos of other groups of children who appeared to be unaccompanied minors arriving at La Guardia. Cristina Jimenez of United We Dream told the New York Post that she saw several children arrive around 9:30 p.m. “I saw a few of them coming out with plastic bags,” said Jimenez. “What I saw just broke my heart. They looked terrified.”

Earlier tonight we saw a group of immigrant children arrive at La Guardia, one as young as 5 or 6 years old. How long will it take to reunite these children with their families? The Trump Administration must be held accountable. #MoralEmergency #FreedomForImmigrants pic.twitter.com/aSRYFBSb5x — Bend the Arc: Jewish Action (@jewishaction) June 21, 2018

I’m at LaGuardia airport in NYC. Youth & children separated from their families are landing in terminal B taken to shelters in Westchester & LI. @AmericanAir must stop enabling Trump’s deportation force. #FreedomForImmigrants #AbolishICE pic.twitter.com/1YsmKj7c6R — Cristina Jimenez (@CrisAlexJimenez) June 21, 2018

Calls went out on social media for people to come to the airport to witness the children’s transfer, and protest the Trump administration’s policies toward families apprehended at the border. Stosh Cotler, one of the rally’s organizers, told the Post that a person on a flight with the immigrant children tipped her off about their arrival. “We want to let them know that there are thousands of people who see them, who love them and who will fight for them,” Cotler said.

We are in the Southwest terminal at @LGAairport with @UNITEDWEDREAM. Children are still arriving on planes tonight and being driven off. Their parents are being held thousands of miles away. We need people to come and witness. This is a #MoralEmergency — Bend the Arc: Jewish Action (@jewishaction) June 21, 2018

URGENT CALL to all in the NYC vicinity: Planes are still arriving TONIGHT(after midnight) at LaGuardia Airport RIGHT NOW w/ children taken from their parents at the border. Need ppl at LGA to document/protest this travesty. My crew is there. Activist groups have sent out the call https://t.co/oIqdjsaQv0 — Michael Moore (@MMFlint) June 21, 2018

Hundreds of people showed up, transferring from terminal to terminal as they tried to anticipate which flights might be carrying immigrant children.

New Yorkers are gathering at LaGuardia Airport to welcome immigrant children in case more arrive tonight.



Many signs read: “no están solos” / “you are not alone” “los queremos” / “we love you” #FreedomForImmigrants #MoralEmergency pic.twitter.com/5aD3aVGduz — Bend the Arc: Jewish Action (@jewishaction) June 21, 2018

“This is what solidarity looks like.” Right now at LaGuardia. Our tax dollars have funded the terrorization of families seeking refuge. Let’s keep showing up people #FamilesBelongTogether pic.twitter.com/hoiU8cwA6K — Baratunde (@baratunde) June 21, 2018

Terminals are packed with HUNDREDS of NYers who showed up in solidarity for children, with messages of love, singing in Spanish, “Cielito Lindo”.#FamiliesBelongTogether#FreedomForImmigrants#AbolishICE pic.twitter.com/ftiGirUSpK — Make the Road NY 🦋 (@MaketheRoadNY) June 21, 2018

Happening NOW at LaGuardia Airport in NYC: citizens gathering to greet kids separated from their parents by the Trump administration #FamiliesBelongTogether #FreedomforImmigrants pic.twitter.com/sRXpR7Ndq8 — ACLU (@ACLU) June 21, 2018

POWERFUL closing at LGA Term C: 100s chant “I believe that we will win!” Crowd rededicates itself to showing up for immigrant children, family members, and community members WHEREVER and WHENEVER. #FreedomForImmigrants #FamiliesBelongTogether CC: @UNITEDWEDREAM @MaketheRoadNY pic.twitter.com/NUp29c2WkA — Daniel Altschuler 🦋 (@altochulo) June 21, 2018

There was a still a sizable crowd when gates closed early on Thursday morning, and activists said they intend to continue drawing attention to the plight of children taken from their families.

It's now 1:53am here in NYC and the crowd at LaGuardia is standing strong to say #FamiliesBelongTogether pic.twitter.com/tg1avUxOCC — ACLU (@ACLU) June 21, 2018