The Latino civil rights group, League of United Latin American Citizens, in a briefing this week announced a national strategy to help immigrant child refugees.

LULAC members are being asked to organize events for a nationwide launch on Sept. 6 for its Border Children Relief Project.

The events will be held at local Feeding America food banks in cities with high concentrations of relocated refugee children- - Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, New York City, and Washington D.C. Many sites will offer pro bono legal advice services and health screenings.

LULAC says the majority of the 55,000 unaccompanied children come from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras. Some come because of economic factors, but the majority are fleeing violence -- whether gang-related or because of volatile government administrations.

"There is a humanitarian crisis that has forced thousands of Central American children to desperately flee to the U.S. in search of refugee protection. LULAC has acted quickly, especially in light of Congress's failure to act quickly enough to prevent a humanitarian disaster from occurring, said Brent Wilkes, National Executive Director for LULAC. "These are scared children that by escaping gang violence, rape, and homicide arrive in another country where they don't know the language or legal structure. It's really important for us to provide material and legal resources to the children that have been relocated to families across the country, since these are the children that most need the help."

LULAC say what is different now are the numbers. From 2004 to 2011, the number of unaccompanied children arriving in the U.S. averaged between 7,000 and 8,000 annually. In fiscal year 2012, the number of unaccompanied children taken into U.S. custody jumped to over 13,000 children. In fiscal year 2013, the number reached over 24,000 and the current projection for fiscal year 2014 is higher than the earlier estimate of 60,000 (upwards of 90,000) children coming to the U.S.

The demographics of those arriving are also different. This time there are more girls, and the children are younger, and estimates are 80 percent them are suffering from trauma.

LULAC is also providing members with talking points for them to write to news editors and their elected officials to press them to support the children and dispel the myths and misunderstandings about the children.

Organizations like LULAC are stepping in where Congress has been slow to respond. President Obama submitted a request to Congress for emergency funding to meet the surge of arrivals of Central American children in the summer.

The Senate and House of Representatives tried to pass an appropriations bill in July before the August congressional recess, but the Senate was unable to secure enough votes.

House Republicans were able to pass two pieces of legislation prior to the start of the August 2014 recess that would have undermined the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 and denied the extension of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. Both of these bills were opposed by LULAC. Neither of these bills are expected to pass the Senate, and President Obama has also expressed his intent to use his veto authority.

"These children are fleeing some of the worst violence in the world. In El Salvador and Honduras we are talking about countries with the highest homicide rates in the world, and that continues to be brought to light. But we see a Republican party that is unwilling to really recognize that reality and doesn't want to look at these children and see them as refugees," Andrea Cristina Mercado from We Belong Together told Latin Post at the time of the vote.

"I think the Latino community understands the undertones of racism in these policy efforts combined with their responses to immigration reform. When it is brown children they are unwilling to stand up for decent human rights. I think that is one of the reasons there is so much outrage at the Republican party's unwillingness to show any kind of compassion, and continue to exploit these children for political games, and rile up an extreme right-wing base and tap into fear," said Mercado.

LULAC has run campaigns like this before. Their voter registration and mobilization model, "The Future is in Your Hands" -- registered and mobilized an unprecedented 12 million Latino voters in 2012.

"Let us urge our elected representatives to look beyond partisanship and act with compassion and common sense," Wilkes said. "To deny these child refugees access to counsel and a proper hearing, would be to condemn them to a life of violence, rape, and in many cases, death."