On Thursday, two families filed a class-action lawsuit against the city of New York, alleging that the administration for children’s services (ACS) abuses its emergency removal power to take children from their parents without a court order. The families say that Black people and Latinos are disproportionately affected by the practice.

The “emergency removal” power is supposed to be used only in extreme and urgent situations in which there is not enough time to obtain a court order. Instead, the lawsuit alleges, the ACS is using a racially discriminatory emergency removal policy that allows the agency to bypass judicial review. The policy, which separates parents from their children, can cause lasting harm to the families that are affected.

“ACS has perverted a profound but limited government power into a widespread and unconstitutional policy of extrajudicial family separation – a policy that predominantly and disproportionately harms Black and Latino families,” David Shalleck-Klein, executive director and founder of the Family Justice Law Center, said in a statement. “Because of the bravery of the families leading this landmark class action lawsuit, meaningful change is possible.”

When it is necessary to remove a child from their parents, the ACS must first seek a court order, pursuant to the law. If a child is in immediate danger, the administration may exercise its emergency removal power. However, an April 2026 study found that the ACS uses its emergency power in more than 50% of removals.

Black and Latino families bear the brunt of the removals, as 90% of all emergency removals in the city affect them. White families, on the other hand, make up only about 3% of removals.

“ACS’s policy is yet another example of a centuries-old government practice that terrorizes Black and Latino families by taking their children,” Julia Hernandez and Tarek Ismail, co-directors of Cuny Law’s Family Defense Clinic, said in a statement. “For too long, ACS has relied on fear and intimidation to trample the rights of New York City families. This lawsuit will hold ACS accountable for its harms while ending its practice of unconstitutional family separation.”

Last week, the US court of appeals for the second circuit held that it was unconstitutional for the ACS to separate children from their parents if there is time to obtain judicial review. Caseworkers, the court said, are personally liable for illegal family separations. The lawsuit brought today seeks to prevent family separations from happening.

“ACS workers are wolves in sheep’s clothing, and you have to be very cautious with them when you’re a Black or Latino parent,” plaintiff Denise Archer, who filed under a pseudonym, said in a statement. “I tried to go to ACS to seek some type of assistance when my family was going through a hard time, and it turned into an almost three-year separation where I had to fight every step of the way to get my kids returned home. Even though ACS is supposed to be the entity you go to when you’re a family in need, they have their own hidden agendas, and my family and I had to pay the price of that.”

The lawsuit was filed by a coalition of legal and advocacy groups on behalf of parents and children in the city. The parents are represented by the Family Justice Law Center, the NYU Family Defense Clinic, the Cuny School of Law Family Defense Clinic, the Center for Constitutional Rights, and Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP, while the children are represented by the Legal Aid Society’s Juvenile Rights Practice and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP.