2023-09-21 22:41:00
(CNN) — The number of migrant crossings at the border between Mexico and the United States increases once more. Why is this happening and what might happen now?
To better understand the situation, CNN spoke with Ariel Ruiz Soto, a policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington.
Ruiz says there is a key detail that many debates regarding migration and the US-Mexico border often leave out.
“In general,” he says, “we don’t look any further south.”
Ruiz says the number of border crossings is likely to continue to increase, noting there are three reasons why this is happening right now:
1. There has been a sharp increase in Venezuelans crossing the Darien Gap
Data from the Panamanian government shows that the number of migrants making the dangerous journey through the Darién Gap is increasing, Ruiz says.
Many of these migrants come from Venezuela, where a socioeconomic crisis, fueled by the government of questioned President Nicolás Maduro and aggravated by the Covid-19 pandemic and US sanctions, has led one in four Venezuelans to flee the country since 2015. .
Data coming from the Darién Gap, a treacherous crossing through the jungles of Panama and Colombia, has become an important tool for predicting what we can expect to happen at the US-Mexico border. Ruiz describes it as an “omen for the future.”
“No matter what the US does today, in five weeks or so, we are likely to see the number of migrants from Venezuela grow by the same amount or more,” says Ruiz, “unless Mexico reinforces law enforcement or something else happens in the region.
2. Many migrants have been waiting in Mexico for months
US policies at the border changed in May, when authorities lifted public health restrictions from the time of the Covid-19 pandemic and implemented new measures aimed at deterring illegal immigration. And the data immediately followingward seemed to indicate that the deterrent effect was working.
But even though the number of arrests at the U.S.-Mexico border has decreased, Ruiz says data from officials in Mexico and Honduras tells a different story. Yes, the number of migrants crossing into the United States has decreased. But migrants continued to make their way north through Central America and Mexico.
“People kept migrating,” says Ruiz. “They just spent more time in Mexico.”
Many migrants were waiting “to understand what the Biden administration’s policies would be following Title 42,” Ruiz says.
Both migrants and smugglers follow US policies closely, Ruiz says, and many adjust their plans accordingly.
“If human traffickers realize that families can get through, more families will come,” he says. And, similarly, migrants are more likely to cross in areas of the border where they have heard that more people have been able to do so.
3. The number of Mexican migrants “has increased notably”
Rising violence in certain regions of Mexico has also fueled increased migration.
“There are more Mexicans trying to come,” says Ruiz.
U.S. government data shows more Mexican families arriving at the border, likely to seek asylum, he says. In July 2022, for example, CBP figures indicate 4,000 encounters by authorities with Mexican families at the border. A year later, that number had more than quadrupled, reaching almost 22,000.
It’s important to remember that a complicated mix of factors fuels migration in the Western Hemisphere, Ruiz says.
“These are the three levers that are in play right now. And regardless of what the Biden administration does today or tomorrow,” he says, “the people who are already on the way are going to continue forward, unless something else happens in the region”.
— CNN’s Nick Paton Walsh, Natalie Gallón, Brice Lainé and Carlos Villalón contributed to this report.
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