Migrant children at the US-Mexico border. Photo: Getty Images.
The United States will allow the entry of up to 30,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela each month, but it will tighten restrictions already in place with the arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic on those attempting to cross the border to cross with Mexico without the required documents.
“These measures will expand and accelerate legal avenues for orderly migration and have new consequences for those who do not use these legal avenues,” the White House said in a statement Thursday.
The migrant quota will be limited to those who already have a financial sponsor in the US and pass a security clearance that allows them to live and work in the country for up to two years.
And those attempting to enter illegally will be expelled under the health regulation known as Title 42, with police intervention and in coordination with Mexico.
A similar program for Venezuelans was launched in October at a quota of 24,000 per year and is now being expanded to other nationalities to ease migratory pressures on the United States’ southern border.
“Today we are announcing some significant steps we are taking to not only expand legal avenues into the United States, but to continue to impose consequences on those who attempt to enter the United States illegally,” said a senior official at the Biden government.
“The legal avenues we are announcing today are generous, but at the same time there are serious consequences if circumvented,” the official said.
Biden will also use his speech to pressure Republicans to stop blocking his immigration reform proposals and border measures, and to urge Congress to provide the resources needed.
The Democratic president will visit El Paso, Texas on Sunday, his first trip to the southwest border Since taking office, as a Republican, criticism of his approach to border security has continued to come.
Under the plan announced on Thursday, Mexico will take in up to 30,000 deported migrants from Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti and Venezuela each month, according to a White House fact sheet. According to government sources, US border officials encountered 82,000 migrants of these nationalities at the border with Mexico in November.
Migrants who cannot be deported to Mexico are increasingly being subjected to an expedited deportation process known as “expedited deportation,” a senior official said.
As Biden administration officials reported this Thursday, the expansion is based on the “success” of the plan for Venezuelan immigrants.
“A streamlined legal pathway has been shown to reduce irregular migration and facilitate safe and orderly migration,” an official told reporters.
According to the authorities, thanks to the plan for Venezuelans, the number of Venezuelan migrants arriving at the border has been reduced by 90%, a “dramatic” drop in the number of those who “decide to risk their lives with traffickers”.
Record numbers of migrant arrivals and detentions are becoming a growing political headache for Biden.
More than two million people were arrested trying to cross the border in the most recent fiscal year that ended September 30, a 24% increase from the previous year.
In December, an average of 700 to 1,000 people were arrested at the land border every day, not counting migrants from Cuba and Haiti trying to reach US territory by sea.
Of the total number of arrests, nearly 500,000 were Venezuelan, Cuban and Nicaraguan nationals.
Title 42
Those migrants who do not have a sponsor and attempt to enter the US illegally will be expelled under Title 42.
That title, an old health rule activated during Donald Trump’s presidency, allowed migrants to be expelled due to the coronavirus health emergency without giving them the opportunity to seek asylum.
According to US authorities at the time, it was introduced to prevent the spread of Covid-19 in prisons.
After the pandemic, however, the measure will be maintained.
She has been accused by migrant rights organizations of “anti-immigration policy disguised as a health protection measure”.
Since it came into force in March 2020, the rule has resulted in more than 2.4 million expulsions from the United States of migrants without being able to apply for asylum.
Title 42 has been applied disproportionately to those of nationalities to which Mexico has acquiesced: in addition to its own citizens, Guatemalans, Hondurans, Salvadorans, and more recently Venezuelans.
In the last fiscal year alone, 962,000 of those who returned across the border came from Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador and fewer than 10,000 from Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba.
Eliminating Title 42 was one of Biden’s key campaign promises, but the Supreme Court upheld it.
(With information from BBC World and Euronews)
See also:
The US policy that favors irregular, illegal and unsafe emigration from Cuba (+ video)