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Haslam Expresses Concerns Over Undocumented Children In Tennessee

Matt Moon, WUOT News

The debate that has erupted over the estimated 30,000 undocumented minors that have streamed into the United States from Central America now includes Tennessee.

On Friday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced 760 of those children had been sent to stay with sponsor families in Tennessee. By the end of the day, Governor Bill Haslam had fired off a letter to the White House expressing his displeasure with the news.

Officials in Nashville should have been notified in advance that the children where headed to Tennessee, the governor's letter read.

"Not only was our state not informed prior to any of the children being brought here, I still have not been contacted and have no information about these individuals or their sponsors other than what was posted on the HHS website and subsequently reported by media," Haslam wrote.

Haslam also posed eight questions to the president, including how long the children will be in Tennessee, how the sponsors were selected and how the children will be cared for while in the state. The letter closes with a request for a prompt response from the Obama Administration.

Tennessee is not the only state where the undocumented children have been sent. About 1,500 have gone to New Jersey. About 1,100 are headed to Georgia. In other states, the issue has been much more heated. Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant has threatened to block any attempt to move some of the children to his state, while Republican lawmakers in Wisconsin said they don't want any undocumented children coming there. In Iowa, local groups and more than 100 families say they're ready to accept the children, in contrast to Governor Terry Branstad's opposition to the plan.