On Thursday, Vice President Kamala Harris promised to take more Ukrainian refugees on a trip abroad, but just hours earlier, a Ukrainian family had been barred from seeking asylum in the US, according to their lawyer and advocates on the ground.
For almost two years, the US southern border has been largely closed to asylum seekers due to a public health order imposed by the Trump administration at the start of the coronavirus pandemic.
Since its enactment in March 2020, the use of the public health authority – Section 42 – has drawn sharp criticism from allies of President Joe Biden, and this week it contrasted sharply with the stance European countries have taken towards Ukrainian refugees.
More than 2 million people have fled war-torn Ukraine in the past few weeks, most of them to Poland. During a visit to Warsaw on Thursday, Harris vowed to support a solution to the massive influx of migrants coming from Ukraine and said the US was ready to take in more migrants.
“The United States is absolutely ready to do everything we can and must do,” Harris said.
But at home, strict border policies that have left thousands of migrants in limbo have also kept a Ukrainian family from fleeing the war.
A Ukrainian woman and her children – aged six, 12 and 14 – attempted to seek asylum at the port of entry of San Isidro in southern California, but were denied entry by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials, citing Trump-era border policies that remain in place. , according to Blaine Bookie, who has spoken to officials and represents the family.
The family arrived in Tijuana, Mexico, which is across from San Diego, on Monday after fleeing Ukraine in late February, Buka said.
The family approached CBP officers on Wednesday, but they prevented the mother and children from entering the US, preventing them from seeking asylum in the US. “They had to leave because they are fleeing the war,” said Buki, legal director of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies. “She doesn’t know what’s going on,” Buki added, referring to her mother.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, a New York Democrat, cited the situation while speaking to reporters as part of his appeal to the administration calling for Section 42 to be repealed.
“This is not, this is not who we are as a country,” Schumer said.
Why migrants came through Mexico
Ukrainians have tried to cross the US-Mexican border since before the war this year and make up only a small fraction of the nationalities arriving at the border. From October 2021 to January, the CBP encountered just over 1,000 Ukrainians along the southern U.S. border, according to the agency. After being taken into custody, the Ukrainians have largely been processed and allowed to remain in the US while they file their asylum applications.
“Since at least 2015, we have seen several hundred Ukrainians arriving at the US-Mexico border. That number started rising in 2021 and grew even faster in fiscal 2022,” said Jessica Bolter, associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute.
According to Bolter, Ukrainians tend to fly into Mexico, where it’s easy to get a travel visa, and then proceed to ports of entry along the southern US border, rather than trying to cross the border illegally.
The San Ysidro port of entry has seen a steady increase in Ukrainian and Russian migrants for several months, with some opting to travel to the port to seek asylum to avoid rejection before arriving in the US, a CBP spokesman said.
The US is providing millions of dollars of humanitarian aid to support people fleeing Ukraine. Harris on Thursday also announced almost $53 million in new humanitarian aid through the US Agency for International Development.
Most Ukrainian refugees are heading to other parts of Europe, but refugee advocates have also called on the administration to expedite the refugee resettlement process, which can be lengthy and burdensome for Ukrainians. The US has previously resettled thousands of Ukrainian refugees, but it is not clear how many will eventually arrive in the United States as refugees from the current conflict.
The Department of Homeland Security recently extended a form of humanitarian aid to Ukrainians in the US that allows them to stay in the country and provides protection from deportation when their visas expire. The relief, known as temporary protected status, only applies to people who are already in the US.