Agency confirms it chartered flights carrying minors that landed at Wilkes-Barre/Scranton...

It looks like The Department of Heath and Human Services is in charge of relocating illegal aliens into the heartland of the United States.

Agency confirms it chartered flights carrying minors that landed at Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport
BY ERIC MARK STAFF WRITER Dec 28, 2021 Updated 7 hrs ago

Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport
Four charter flights carrying minors in the care of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency recently landed at the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport in Pittston Twp.

The Department of Heath and Human Services confirmed Tuesday it organized charter flights carrying minors that landed at the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport this month.

The airport board of directors plans an executive session Wednesday to discuss potential legal issues surrounding the flights, which arrived Dec. 11, 17, and two on Dec. 25, said Chairman Tim McGinley. Airport board members — the three Lackawanna County commissioners as well as McGinley, who is the Luzerne County Council chair, Acting Luzerne County Manager Romilda Crocamo and Luzerne County Councilwoman LeeAnn McDermott — will discuss “what kind of litigation we might face,” McGinley said.

The flights that originated in El Paso, Texas, were filled with minors, translators and chaperones, who boarded buses right after they got off planes in Pittston Twp.

Passengers on the Dec. 11 flight got on buses bound for Brooklyn, New York, said Jim Gallagher, president of Aviation Technologies Inc., the airport’s fixed base operator. Gallagher said he does not know where passengers from the Dec. 17 and Dec. 25 flights went after the buses left the airport. A charter company would not normally provide that information to airport officials, since it would not impact airport operations, Gallagher said.

Acting Luzerne County Manager Romilda Crocamo said Tuesday that state Department of Human Services officials told her none of the passengers from the charter flights stayed in Luzerne County.

Gallagher, who previously said the charter flights were organized by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, confirmed Tuesday that HHS organized the flights. The confusion stemmed from information provided by the charter companies, which listed the trips as “ICE flights,” Gallagher said.

In a statement issued Tuesday, an HHS spokesperson said the department has a “legal responsibility to safely care for unaccompanied children until they can be swiftly unified with a parent or a vetted sponsor.”

“As part of the unification process, our Office of Refugee Resettlement facilitates travel for the children in its custody to their family or sponsors across the country,” the statement continues. “Over recent weeks, unaccompanied children passed through the Wilkes-Barre airport en route to their final destination to be unified with their parents or vetted sponsor.”

The airport must follow all regulations established by federal aviation authorities, which includes accepting flights chartered by government agencies, McGinley said.

“If we don’t follow them we might put the airport at risk,” he said.

The airport lies within the 8th Congressional District, represented by Democrat Matt Cartwright of Moosic.

On Tuesday, Cartwright issued a statement in response to the outcry over the flights.

“These are legitimate concerns and we’ve been looking into it,” he said. “We know that during the last two administrations, federal agencies have responded to overcrowding issues by relocating unaccompanied children to the custody of properly screened family members, host sponsors, and charitable institutions.”

U.S. Rep. Dan Meuser, R-9, Dallas, and former U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta, a Republican, have railed against the apparent secrecy surrounding the flights and demanded answers from state and federal officials.