More than 2.6 million children are being raised in the United States by grandparents, other relatives
and close family friends with no parent in the household. 1 These “grandfamilies” or “kinship
families” are families in which relatives or close family friends step up to raise children unexpectedly
because their parents cannot due to opioid or other substance use, mental health challenges,
incarceration, death or other issues. With increased immigration enforcement and children being
separated from their parents at the U.S. border, grandparents and other relatives are stepping up to
raise many of these children, too. The national data is compelling. Although we do not know how many
of these grandfamilies form as a result of a parent’s detainment or deportation, we do know that
approximately 21 percent of the 2.6 million children in grandfamilies – or 544,000 children – are living
in immigrant grandfamilies, meaning the child, he parent(s), and/or the kinship care provider(s)
are foreign-born.