How many children have been found since Biden’s term

1. The claim being debated: a headline “300,000 missing”

Multiple Republican officials and conservative outlets have amplified figures saying roughly 300,000 unaccompanied children are “missing” or “unaccounted for” after being released from federal custody, with Senator Grassley and House members citing that kind of aggregate number in remarks and press releases ^{[5] [6]}; the same large totals appear in some Department of Homeland Security–aligned releases and political messaging ^[3].

2. What the government oversight reports actually documented

The Department of Homeland Security inspector general and congressional summaries cited specific data problems rather than a simple “missing kids” count: for example, IG testimony and House oversight materials noted tens of thousands of records with incomplete or invalid sponsor addresses (about 31,000), and more than 43,000 children who failed to appear for hearings or could not be tracked through routine federal monitoring mechanisms—figures presented as programmatic failures or data gaps rather than a verified count of exploited or disappeared children ^{[7] [8]}.

3. Recovery operations and reported “finds” are uneven and partisan

Separate recovery efforts and task forces have produced different tallies: one post-2025 task force reported locating more than 22,000 unaccompanied minors after door‑to‑door checks (reported by a right‑leaning outlet) ^[1], while the Trump administration’s DHS later announced it had “located” more than 127,000 children as of December 2025, a figure publicized by Secretary Noem and carried by conservative media—both claims are reported but not reconciled against the inspector general’s original datasets in the sources provided ^[2].

4. Independent fact‑checking and experts caution about context

Mainstream fact‑checks and journalists emphasize that headline counts conflate different categories—total children released to sponsors over several years, records with incomplete paperwork, those who missed immigration hearings, and children actually at risk or trafficked—and that large totals sometimes span periods that include prior administrations, undermining the notion that all were “lost” during one presidency ^{[4] [9]}. The Associated Press and CBS notably argued that the “300,000” framing lacks the necessary documentary differentiation and that much of the problem is paperwork and tracking gaps ^{[4] [9]}.

5. Why the numbers diverge and why no single verified “found” number exists in these sources

Differences arise because sources use different baselines (total UACs encountered since a date versus those released during a specific administration), different definitions (unaccounted for vs. missing vs. failed to appear), and different methods (IG record reviews vs. knock‑and‑ask recovery operations vs. political press counts), and because the materials provided here include partisan claims and later recovery tallies that have not been audited in the public reporting cited ^{[3] [1] [2] [7]}.

Bottom line: what can be stated with confidence

Based on the documents and reporting provided, there is no single, independently verified number of “children found since Biden’s term” that can be confirmed here; the provided sources report recovery tallies ranging from roughly 22,000 located by one task force ^[1] to claims of more than 127,000 located announced by DHS Secretary Noem ^[2], while inspector‑general and congressional materials describe tens of thousands of records with incomplete addresses or failure to appear (about 31,000 and 43,000 respectively) rather than a reconciled found/not‑found count ^{[7] [8]}. Independent fact‑checking outlets advise treating the large “300,000 missing” figure as lacking essential context and not equivalent to a verified count of children actually lost, harmed, or recovered ^{[4] [9]}.