Here’s one way to help refugee families that won’t cost you a dime

When Jeff Wilensky heard about a 3-year-old immigrant child in need of a flight from Ann Arbor, Mich. were he was detained, he didn’t know at first how he could help.

The child was one of more than 3,000 separated from their parents while crossing the U.S. border with Mexico under a “zero-tolerance” immigration policy enacted by President Donald Trump in May. The child and his father had been reunited after Trump walked back on the family separations in July, but the two could not afford tickets home to their family.

Wilensky soon found the thousands of frequent-flier miles he had amassed through his position at a Michigan-based tech company — for which he travels more than 20 weeks a year — could get the child and his father flights at no additional cost to him.

The reunification was coordinated by the Michigan Support Circle, a nonprofit focused on reuniting families. The organization gave Wilensky updates throughout the process. “People are often reaching and trying to figure out what they can do to make a real impact,” he said. “It is great to find an organization and a way to help that has a direct impact on families.”

Wilensky is one of a growing number of people donating frequent-flier miles to help reunited children separated at the border with their parents. Under Trump’s zero-tolerance policy, many children were placed in facilities thousands of miles from their parents and, after the policy was changed, some parents faced fees of thousands of dollars to get their children back. Hundreds of children are still detained and have not been reunited with their parents.

Miles4Migrants facilitates donations of frequent flyer miles for refugees, asylum seekers, and other immigrants. After Wilensky’s wife tweeted about their experiences donating miles on Aug. 6, it was retweeted more than 23,000 retweets and over 100,000 favorites, more donations are pouring in.

In the past 24 hours, Miles4Migrants has received donations of 3 million miles, surpassing the amount of donations in the year and a half since it launched. “It’s pretty incredible to see the impact one tweet can have,” Andy Freedman, co-founder of Miles4Migrants told MarketWatch.

Miles4Migrants

Aid organizations notify Miles4Migrants when someone has been legally granted asylum and only needs a flight. The organization then matches the case with a donor who can help. The average donation to Miles4Migrants is about 39,000 miles and the average flight for a migrant-in-need is worth 20,000 miles. Previously, Miles4Migrants worked largely with refugees from Syria, Iran and Africa.

Currently, travelers have to book the flights for migrants directly, as facilitated through Miles4Migrants. Otherwise, travelers can only donate miles to a handful of approved organizations and, in many cases, miles must be donated in multiples of 1,000. The Red Cross, for example, accepts miles from American Airlines AAL, +1.19% Delta Air Lines DAL, +1.38% Southwest Airlines LUV, +1.87%   and United Airlines UAL, +1.11%

It has reached out to several of these companies to make it easier for people to donate miles to helping refugees, but as yet has not come up with a simpler solution. American Airlines told MarketWatch it allows people do donate miles to a number of programs, though none of them are specifically for immigrant reunification. United Airlines and Delta Air Lines donated a number of flights to reunite immigrants after Trump’s policy was changed.

“My sincere hope is this is recognized as a cause customers want to donate their miles to,” Freedman said. “I personally have been touched by the fact that United has stepped up and is reuniting families — the next natural step would be to allow customers to do the same.”

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