Merkley, Oregon’s junior Democratic senator, has made numerous trips to the US border with Mexico over the past year as the debate over illegal immigration and border security continues.

United States Senator Jeff Merkley said he will return to the southern border on Monday to investigate the death of an 8-year-old child who was in US custody.

Merkley, Oregon’s junior Democratic senator, has made numerous trips to the US border with Mexico over the past year as the debate over illegal immigration and border security continues to take center stage. In June, Merkley made national headlines after he was turned away from visiting a children’s detention center in Brownsville, Texas, while investigating the Trump administration’s child separation policy.

This visit comes two weeks after Felipe Gomez Alonzo, an 8-year-old boy from Guatemala, died in a New Mexico hospital after being detained by immigration authorities. A New Mexico medical investigator's office determined Felipe had the flu when he died, but more tests were needed to determine his cause of death. He was the second child to die in US custody in December.

“The death of any child is a tragedy,” Merkley said in a news release on Saturday. “As a parent, I can’t imagine the heartbreak of fleeing to a new country, only to watch your child die just at the moment you thought you had reached safety. We need full transparency and full accountability for these deaths, which is why I’m going back to the border to get answers.”

Merkley will visit the Alamogordo Border Patrol Station in New Mexico with members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. According to the news release, Merkley will “ask questions directly of Border Patrol and Trump Administration staff to find out more about the circumstances surrounding Felipe’s death and whether enough is being done to prevent more tragedies along the border.”

In December, Merkley visited a migrant children’s tent camp in Texas, where he and other Democrats called for the shutdown of the camp.