By Azam Ahmed and Mike Tackett
CANCÚN, Mexico — The Trump administration announced a new migration policy Thursday that will require asylum seekers who cross the Mexican border illegally to return to Mexico while their cases are decided.
The United States has been trying for months to get Mexico’s leaders to agree to house those migrants, and on Thursday Mexico’s new government reluctantly agreed.
The American secretary of homeland security, Kirstjen M. Nielsen, said the move would prevent people from using the asylum process as a way of slipping into the United States and remaining in the country illegally.
“Today we are announcing historic measures to bring the illegal immigration crisis under control,” she said. “Aliens trying to game the system to get into our country illegally will no longer be able to disappear into the United States, where many skip their court dates.”
In a statement, she said, “‘Catch and release’ will be replaced with ‘catch and return.’”
The new policy, announced as the president and Congress were at odds over funding for a border wall, amounts to the boldest effort yet by the Trump administration to discourage people from seeking refuge in the United States. It follows a series of other curbs that had been introduced, including the separation of migrant families, which was later reversed in an executive order after a public outcry.
The migrant issue has put considerable pressure on the United States’ relationship with Mexico as Trump administration restrictions have left thousands of asylum seekers stranded in Mexican border towns, overwhelming local shelters and resources.
The new policy would also alleviate pressure on American border agents, who for months have argued that they are overwhelmed by the record-breaking number of migrant families seeking asylum.
Mexican officials say they were told of the latest American decision on Thursday morning in letters from the Department of Homeland Security and the United States chargé d’affaires in Mexico, John S. Creamer. The letters stated that the returns would begin immediately under a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act.
The Mexican Foreign Ministry has essentially agreed to accept the decision by the United States, and will be forced to house thousands of people from other countries, particularly from Central America, as they await their asylum decisions.
A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, Roberto Velasco, said the move did not represent an agreement between the two countries, but rather “a unilateral move by the United States that we have to respond to.”
Mr. Velasco said the rules would apply only to new asylum applicants, not to individuals who have already entered the United States with processes underway. The United States did not initially make clear if the policy applied only to new applicants.
The administration’s move is a sharp departure from decades of American asylum practice, according to legal experts and advocates. The United States has long accepted individuals from across the world fleeing harm or persecution in their home countries.
The program is almost certain to be challenged in the United States courts by human rights groups and advocates. Many have already claimed that sending persecuted individuals to Mexico, one of the most violent countries in the world, places them in harm’s way.
“This deal is a stark violation of international law, flies in the face of U.S. laws passed by Congress, and is a callous response to the families and individuals running for their lives,” said Margaret Huang, the executive director of Amnesty International.
While the individuals would be allowed to return to the United States for court hearings, they would remain in Mexico under a humanitarian visa until their process is completed.
Mexico’s decision to accept the asylum seekers is likely to be seen as a capitulation by the new government to President Trump, who proclaimed over Twitter two weeks ago that Mexico would house asylum applicants to the United States on its soil.
The decision to turn Mexico into a waiting room for migrants seeking entry to the United States is likely to stir anger in Mexico.
Mexico has found itself in the center of Mr. Trump’s ire over migration policy, with the American president lambasting the country for not doing enough to inhibit the passage of Central Americans and others through its territory.
But while Mr. Trump has proposed building walls along the border, Mexico’s new president. Andrés Manuel López Obrador, has taken a different approach.
He and his foreign minister announced a new development plan for southern Mexico and Central America that would require some $30 billion in aid to address the root causes of the migration.
This week, the United States applauded the proposal, and promised to work with the Mexicans to realize that plan with more than $5 billion. But that money did not reflect a new commitment of funds — for the most part, the United States government was already spending it in the region.
“This is total capitulation in exchange for the fig leaf of a nonexistent development plan with no financial commitments by the U.S. and no timetable,” said Jorge Castañeda, a former Mexican foreign minister.
Shelters for asylum seekers in Mexico have already been overwhelmed by people who would previously have been quickly processed into the United States, but now have to wait weeks or months to be allowed in under curbs put in place by the Trump administration.
As with many of the administration’s harshest immigration plans that have been introduced with little notice, it was unclear on Thursday how exactly the new policy would be carried out.
A senior Department of Homeland Security official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that the announcement on Thursday came as a surprise to many people in the agency’s leadership, as well as the rank and file who would be charged with carrying it out.
Correction: December 20, 2018
An earlier version of this article misstated the surname of the spokesman for Mexico’s Foreign Ministry. He is Roberto Velasco, not Velasquez.
Azam Ahmed reported from Cancún, and Mike Tackett from Washington. Caitlin Dickerson contributed reporting from New York, and Kirk Semple from Mexico City.
For more information, go to: http://www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com/
No comments:
Post a Comment