The Secretary of National Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, and the Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, announced this Thursday a plan to deal with the expected avalanche of immigrants at the border after the end on May 11 of the restrictions due to COVID-19. known as Title 42, and when there is a lack of space in detention centers and federal funds to deal with the crisis.
Its main measure will be the opening of
processing centers
for asylum seekers in Central American and Latin American countries to start the procedures (or deny them) long before the migrants can reach the border of the United States and Mexico.
In addition, they announced the creation of a new process for family reunification
paroles
for people from El Salvador, Honduras and Colombia, and changes to the one that already exists for Cuba and Haiti, which will allow the approval of family sponsorship requests.
How processing centers work
The centers would be opened at transit points en route to the United States, Blinken said.
Consular officers would determine at these centers whether immigrants meet the asylum requirements, hoping to dissuade them from continuing on their way if they do not.
The first centers will open in
Guatemala and Colombia
in the coming weeks.
In addition, other countries such as
Canada and Spain
will accept migrants sent from these centers;
The CBP One
mobile app will be strengthened
with which asylum cases are processed
Asylum seekers will be able to go to the centers instead of making the dangerous journey to the border, and there they will also obtain information on how to apply for refugee status or other immigration options to the United States or other countries.
The centers would be
managed by international organizations.
According to a fact sheet published by the Department of Homeland Security, asylum seekers could make an appointment by phone to visit a center.
The authorities are also working to double the number of refugees from the Western Hemisphere.
In addition, the Administration states that it is working with Colombia and Panama to curb migration through the Darien Pass.
"The border will not be open on May 11"
"This approach is based on making migration safer, more orderly and humane," Blinken said, faced with "an unprecedented problem";
and pointed out that the Government seeks to "focus on the causes of migration."
Mayorkas warned that migrants and human smugglers should not interpret the upcoming deadline as meaning that the border is open:
"
This border will not be open on May 11."
People who arrive illegally will also be quickly expelled and barred from re-entering the country for at least five years and will not be able to apply for asylum, Mayorkas explained.
Mayorkas also addressed concerns about the sharp increase in migration in the Caribbean Sea and the Florida Straits over the past year.
He assured that he would disqualify Cuban and Haitian migrants from the sponsorship program launched earlier this year if they are intercepted at sea by the Coast Guard.
Mayorkas insisted that he is looking for solutions to mitigate the increase in migration (including a request for $4.7 billion in emergency funds from Congress, he detailed a week ago).
"We ask Congress to approve the resources we need to continue doing our job," he insisted.
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The border, on the brink of collapse
More than 2.8 million migrants have been returned at the border without the right to request asylum under Title 42, approved in March 2020 by former President Donald Trump, hiding behind the health emergency caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Last Sunday, a caravan with about 3,500 migrants (according to the Mexican government) left Chiapas, Mexico, hoping to reach Mexico City to demand justice for the loss of migrant lives, such as the 40 who died in a center in Ciudad Juárez, and the Honduran killed in the caravan itself.
Mevil Saúl Chacón Mendoz traveled some 26 miles from Tapachula, on the border with Guatemala, to the municipality of Huixtla, where he died.
The acting commissioner of the Border Patrol, Troy Miller, explained in Congress a few weeks ago, citing figures from the United Nations, that there are some 660,000 migrants in Mexico who could reach the border, and that the number of crossings could double,
reaching between 10,000 and 13,000 a day,
after the end of Title 42.
On Sunday there were about
18,000 people in temporary
processing centers of the Office of Customs and Border Protection (CBP, in English) on the southern border, according to anonymity reported by two officials of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which is about to exhaust his annual budget limit, as reported by the news network NBC News.
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The acting director of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service (ICE), Tae Johnson, indicated for his part in a hearing that same day in the House of Representatives that he does not have enough places for all intercepted immigrants.
The Joe Biden government has reduced the capacity of ICE centers by a quarter, he explained, with a
maximum of 34,000 places.
Thus, an increase in arrivals could collapse the system if resources are not expanded, he warned, leading to thousands of migrants being released on US soil.
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More deportations but also legal avenues
The Government has anticipated that it is evaluating various measures to stop the arrival of migrants.
Among them is the possibility of preventing them from applying for asylum at the border if they did not ask for protection in one of the countries on their way to the United States.
Blinken reiterated this Thursday that he will maintain the humanitarian parole program (of two years duration) that since October allows the arrival of 30,000 Venezuelan migrants who begin the asylum process from their country with a sponsor in the US and then travel by plane ;
This measure, established at the same time that these migrants were included among those affected by Title 42, was later extended to Nicaraguans, Haitians and Cubans.
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In February, 22,755 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans arrived in the country with this humanitarian permit, almost twice as many as in January, according to data from the Customs and Border Protection Office (CBP).
So far, the policy has led to a 97% drop in illegal border crossings by migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela, according to authorities.
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Expulsions under Title 8
“We are going to use our immigration authorities under
Title 8, which establishes a consequence for people who arrive between ports of entry and who do not have a legal basis to remain in the country,” said the secretary.
Title 8 is already implemented by the Biden Administration at the border: in February 2023 alone, authorities processed 82,407 migrants under this rule and placed in removal proceedings with a ban on returning for five years and criminal consequences if they try, according to the Department of Homeland Security.
