Acting Attorney General Monty Wilkinson in a memo sent to federal prosecutors on Tuesday rescinded the Trump-era "zero tolerance" policy for immigration offenses that allowed the U.S. government to separate thousands of children from their parents (article available here).
Wilkinson wrote that the policy "was inconsistent with the Department's longstanding principle that we exercise judgment and make individualized assessments in criminal cases. Today's action restores to prosecutors their traditional discretion to make charging decisions based on a careful review of the particular facts and circumstances of individual immigration cases."
Zero tolerance was criticized as a humanitarian failure. A report from the Department of Justice Office of Inspector General, released this month, noted that once parents were separated from their children, there was neither a clear plan nor resources to easily reunite parents with their kids.