2023-05-15 03:12:02
TIJUANA, Mexico (AP) — The limits on asylum implemented by the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic and known as Title 42 were rarely a topic of conversation among many of the thousands of migrants crowded on the border with Mexico.
His gaze was—and still is—fixed on a new US federal government mobile app that grants 1,000 appointments a day to cross the border and claim asylum, while receiving permission to live temporarily in the United States. With demand far exceeding places available, the app has generated frustration among many migrants, and represents a test of the Joe Biden administration’s strategy of developing new legal pathways into the country, which come with consequences. severe for those who cross illegally.
“You start to get desperate, but it’s the only way,” said Teresa Muñoz, 48, who left her home in the state of Michoacán, Mexico, after organized crime beat her and killed her husband. She has spent a month trying to get an appointment through the app, called CBPOne, while she remains in a Tijuana shelter with her two children and a 2-year-old grandson.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas reported that Border Patrol made 6,300 arrests Friday — the first day since Title 42 expired — and another 4,200 arrests Saturday. The numbers are well below more than 10,000 for three days last week as migrants rushed into the United States before new measures to restrict asylum took effect.
“It’s still too early,” Mayorkas said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “We are in the third day, but we have spent months and months planning this transition. And we have been executing our plan. And we will continue to do so.”
Despite the decline in recent days, authorities forecast arrests to peak at 12,000 to 14,000 a day, Border Patrol deputy chief Matthew Hudak said during a court filing. Authorities cannot give a reliable estimate of the number of people who will cross, Hudak said, noting that intelligence reports did not quickly identify a “unique spike” of 18,000 mostly Haitian migrants in Del Rio, Texas, in September. of 2021.
On one day last week there were more than 27,000 migrants in federal custody, a number that could surpass 45,000 by the end of May if authorities cannot release the migrants with a warrant to appear in immigration court, Hudak said. .
The government plans to file appeals with the court on Monday to obtain permission to release the migrants without a summons to appear. Authorities say it takes 90 minutes to two hours to process a single adult for court — which could overwhelm Border Patrol detention facilities — and even longer to process families. Instead, it takes only 20 minutes to release someone with instructions to report to an immigration office within 60 days, a common practice since 2021 to ease overcrowding pressures along the border. .
The Justice Department has even raised the possibility of refusing to take people into custody if it cannot quickly release the migrants, something it called “the worst case scenario.”
President Joe Biden, who spent the weekend at his home in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, said he was hopeful that numbers at the border “will continue to drop,” but acknowledged that “we have a lot more work to do.”
“We also need some more help from Congress, in terms of funding and legislative changes,” Biden told reporters. However, he considered that the handling of the situation at the border is going “much better than all of you expected.”
The government is promoting new legal pathways in an attempt to deter illegal crossings, including 30,000 conditional humanitarian permits a month for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans who apply online, have a financial sponsor and arrive by air.
Hundreds of migrants, mostly Colombians, waited for processing Saturday in the intense heat near Jacumba, California, after sleeping for several days under thatched roofs in San Diego and surviving on limited supplies of crackers and water from from the Border Patrol. Several of them said they crossed illegally after unsuccessfully trying to use the app or after hearing frustrating stories from others.
Ana Cuna, 27, said she and other Colombians paid $1,300 each to be driven across the border after arriving in Tijuana. She said she set foot on US soil hours before Title 42 expired Thursday but, like others, Border Patrol gave her a numbered bracelet and two days later she was still not processed.
Under the Title 42 public health rule, migrants have been denied asylum more than 2.8 million times on the grounds of preventing the spread of COVID-19. After the measure expired, the federal government implemented a policy to deny asylum to people passing through another country, such as Mexico, on their way to the United States, with a few exceptions.
“We want to enter under the law, welcome,” said Cuna, who shared a thatched roof with Colombian women and families hoping to reach Chicago, San Antonio, Philadelphia and Spartanburg, South Carolina.
Releasing migrants without ordering them to appear in court, but with instructions to report to an immigration office within a period of no more than 60 days, became a general practice in 2021. Leaving processing jobs in hands of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) offices created additional delays. For example, ICE offices in New York have a backlog until 2033 just to schedule an initial court appearance.
Federal Judge T. Kent Wetherell, in Pensacola, Florida, ordered in March an end to the practice, which the federal government had already stopped using in any way. The Biden administration decided not to appeal the ruling but resumed the policy last week, saying it was an emergency response. The state of Florida protested the practice, and Wetherell ordered the government to prevent expedited releases for two weeks. He scheduled a hearing for Friday.
Since CBPOne went live on January 12, the app has infuriated many of the migrants with its error messages, difficulties capturing photos, and the hectic daily ritual of flicking thumbs across phone screens. until places sell out in a matter of minutes.
In Tijuana, Muñoz investigated the possibility of smuggling with a smuggler through the mountains east of San Diego, but determined that it would be too costly. He is still haunted by memories of the grueling week he spent hiking through the Arizona desert in the mid-2000s. After saving money by working double shifts at a supermarket near Los Angeles, he returned to Mexico to raise his children.
Last week, the government increased the number of appointments available on the app from 740 to 1,000, began prioritizing those who have been trying the longest, and made places available gradually throughout the day rather than all at once. , which created bottlenecks. So far, Muñoz says she is not convinced.
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Associated Press writer Seung Min Kim contributed to this report from Rehoboth Beach, Delaware.
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