State Contexts and Family Disruption: Female Incarceration Rates and Termination of Parental Rights

Background and Purpose: The US child welfare system is a powerful state institution with unique authority to both support families and impose coercive interventions such as child removal and termination of parental rights (TPR). The passage of the 1997 Adoption and Safe Families Act shifted child welfare policy emphasis to facilitating permanency, rather than family reunification, mandating that agencies pursue TPR when a child remained in foster care for 15 of the last 22. months. However, implementation is highly variable, reflecting the emphasis of local policy regimes. Empirical work suggests that state carceral contexts shape child welfare outcomes, with strong associations between high incarceration rates and increased foster care placements. Given that 80% of incarcerated women are mothers and were the primary caregivers of their minor children prior to incarceration, female incarceration rates are highly consequential to family stability. Thus, this study seeks to examine whether state-level female incarceration rates are associated with the termination of mothers’ parental rights, highlighting carceral spillover in state-level family regulation practices. This study addresses the following research question: To what extent are state-level female incarceration rates associated with the termination of mothers’ parental rights of children in foster care?

Method: Using 2021 data from the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System, we estimate a series of binary logistic regression models predicting TPR. The analytic sample includes children in foster care in FY 2020 with complete case information. Independent variables included race, child’s age at removal, current child placement, removal reason, and state-level female incarceration rates. Models additionally include state-level clustering to account for state-specific policy contexts and variation. Interaction terms for race and removal reason were also included to evaluate heterogeneity in TPR risk across racial groups.

Results: Across model specifications, the child’s race, age at removal, gender, being removed for sexual abuse, child placement, and state female incarceration rates were significantly associated with TPR. Compared to their counterparts, children who are male, White, infants, placed in non-relative foster care, and removed for sexual abuse, had significantly higher odds of TPR. Importantly, state female incarceration rates emerged as a significant predictor of TPR (p < .001) across all model specifications, indicating that children residing in states with more punitive criminal legal policy towards women face elevated risk of permanent family separation. Interaction terms revealed significant variation in TPR risks across racial groups, with Black, Hispanic, and Indigenous children removed facing disproportionate TPR rates depending on the removal reason.

Conclusion and Implications: The present study’s findings suggest that TPR is not the result of individual or case-specific characteristics, but rather state-level carcerality. These findings underscore the necessity to interrogate how overlapping systems of surveillance—criminal-legal and child welfare—jointly structure family regulatory practices and child outcomes, namely family disruption. If child welfare agencies are to protect the well-being of children, state-level actors must decouple decision-making practices from punitive state-level policy regimes. Instead, state actors must prioritize interventions that facilitate family preservation whenever possible to do so safely.