A short-lived increase in migrants on the Arizona-Mexico border may have been due to people trying to enter the U.S. before the “Remain in Mexico” policy restarts, which is likely to happen soon in Arizona.
The surge of migrants this week in the Border Patrol’s Yuma Sector, west of Pima County, seems to have subsided. More than 4,000 undocumented migrants entered the country in the sector from Friday through Monday, Yuma Sector Chief Patrol Agent Chris T. Clem tweeted on Wednesday. The Yuma Sun reported Monday that Border Patrol agents were overwhelmed with migrants, mostly from Cuba, Brazil and Venezuela.
But by Tuesday, images on social media from the border at Yuma showed a couple dozen migrants still waiting to be processed. U.S. officials confirmed the increase appeared to be short-term.
Officials and migrant advocates speculate this recent spike in crossings — about a 30% increase over the daily number that’s been typical over the last few months — was related to the Biden administration announcing reinstatement of the Trump-era “Remain in Mexico” program.
President Joe Biden stopped the program after he took office but was ordered by a U.S. District Court in Texas to reinstate it.
The program, also referred to as Migrant Protection Protocols or MPP, returns migrants who entered the country without a visa or proper documentation to Mexico. They are then expected to wait there for a hearing in U.S. court in about six months, at which point many of the migrants plan to request asylum.
The Department of Homeland Security restarted the program in El Paso on Monday and will expand it to seven ports of entry across the southern border, including Nogales, Arizona.
Humanitarian aid organization Kino Border Initiative, in Nogales, Sonora, received word from officials that the program will start in Nogales on Monday, Dec. 13, said its spokesperson Gia Del Pino.
U.S. officials said they could not confirm when the program will start in Arizona.
“Customs and Border Protection stands ready to address any potential increase in migrant encounters as we work to ensure safety and security of our borders, while managing a fair and orderly immigration system,” said spokesman John Mennell.
Gov. Doug Ducey faulted the Biden administration for incrementally reinstating the Trump policy requiring asylum seekers to stay in Mexico as they await immigration hearings.
The piecemeal implementation led migrants to rush to other parts of the border and cross into the U.S. before the policy is rolled out more widely, Ducey said Tuesday.
Advocates get ready in Tucson
Casa Alitas, a humanitarian-aid nonprofit shelter in Tucson, saw an increase in migrants arriving from the Yuma Sector since Sunday, up to 200 people on Tuesday, said its director of operations Teresa Cavendish.
The shelter is prepared to serve that many people, who will likely be there a short time before traveling to their final destinations in other parts of the country.
Cavendish said she expects that once officials have processed the migrants who came through over the weekend, the larger numbers arriving at Casa Alitas will go down, as the Remain in Mexico policy is restarted in this region and more migrants will be directly returned to Mexico.
The Yuma Sector has seen large numbers of families, including many from South America, showing up at the border to ask for asylum, with numbers increasing from about 790 in October of both 2019 and 2020 to more than 21,600 this October.
The number of migrants fleeing to the U.S. from South America, Cuba and Haiti increased this last year as rising levels of violence and worsening economic and political situations, exacerbated by the pandemic and in some cases climate change, are driving more people from their homes.
Del Pino said once the Remain in Mexico program resumes, humanitarian aid groups in Mexico expect more migrants will be arriving needing services. This could include more people from Brazil and Haiti, who could require services in languages other than Spanish, since currently many migrants from those countries are being allowed to wait in the U.S. for their court dates.
“Many organizations like ours that provide humanitarian aid and shelter and relief to migrants on the ground in Nogales are bracing themselves for being stretched in terms of capacity,” she said. “We’re expected to receive an influx of people arriving to the border. And according to the response from the Mexican government, there won’t be any kind of financial help in terms of resources.”
The Department of Homeland Security says everyone enrolled in MPP who is eligible will be provided a COVID-19 vaccine. As well, the department says it will ensure that migrants enrolled in the program have their cases heard in a timely manner and an opportunity to meet with legal counsel.
Advocates are in talks with the White House to better understand how the administration intends to fulfill the promise of legal guidance to migrants, Del Pino says. “There’s a lot of ambiguity with this new guidance and not a lot of direction in terms of how these things are going to be rolled out,” she said.
Migrants returned to Nogales, Sonora, are expected to have court hearings in El Paso, Texas, and Del Pino says that when MPP was in affect under the Trump administration, many migrants who had to travel from Nogales to El Paso for their court date struggled to pay travel expenses to get there.
Officials ask for resources
Ducey demanded Tuesday that the Biden administration do more to secure the U.S.-Mexico border, speaking with other public officials from a lectern on the border in the Yuma Sector, as nearly a dozen people crossed between a gap in the border fence behind them, The Associated Press reported.
“We need the force of the federal government to secure the border,” Ducey told reporters. “That’s their job. We’re asking the Biden administration to do it.”
The Republican governor said the Arizona National Guard will send a helicopter, six vehicles, four all-terrain vehicles and 24 people to help law enforcement.
Yuma County Sheriff Leon Wilmot said on Monday that as Border Patrol agents struggled to attend to the large number of people crossing the border, some migrants were in need of medical attention and were calling 911, requesting assistance from local law enforcement and hospitals.
“When that takes that resource from that community to address this down here, which should be handled by the federal government, it takes that resource from that community and it straps them on being able to handle their normal calls for service in their communities,” he said.
Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly issued a statement earlier in the week saying he was deeply concerned about the sudden increase in migrants in the Yuma area. He said he was committed to “holding the Biden administration accountable for delivering the resources and support needed to ensure a secure border and a humane and orderly response in Yuma.”
“Arizonans deserve a coordinated federal response to this border crisis that does not burden our border communities,” Kelly said, adding that he introduced a bipartisan bill to address the issue.
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(c) 2021 The Arizona Daily Star
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