Border crossings reportedly decrease after Title 42 rules scrapped

[marmar]

(Guardian UK) Crossings at the US border with Mexico have dropped 50% after Title 42 restrictions ended at the end of Thursday and the Biden White House implemented an arguably tougher immigration policy, American homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said on Sunday.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden on Sunday told White House pool reporters that the border situation immediately after Title 42’s elimination was “much better than you all expected”. The president said he did not plan to visit the border “in the near term” because to do so at this stage “would just be disruptive”.

Mayorkas’s and Biden’s remarks on Sunday were a defense of the policy which replaced the expired measure that allowed border officials to expel migrants 2.7m times to their home country or Mexico without hearing their asylum claims, ostensibly to limit the spread of Covid-19.

Advocates have argued that the new Biden restrictions mimic two Donald Trump-era policies, but Mayorkas defiantly touted the updated measures, saying on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday that the “US Border Patrol has experienced a 50% drop in the number of encounters versus what we were experiencing earlier in the week before Title 42 ended”. ..........(more)

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/may/14/border-crossings-reportedly-decrease-after-title-42-rules-scrapped

[Johnny2X2X]

1. Good news

Almost like there isn’t really a crisis at all.

[MichMan]

2. Not a huge surprise considering that they are down over 90% since President Biden took office.

[BumRushDaShow]

3. Per this -

https://apnews.com/article/immigration-border-title-42-mexico-asylum-7a1c404c572e37c65710c96a1f67f2c0

(snip)

Migrants are now essentially barred from seeking asylum in the U.S. if they did not first apply online or seek protection in the countries they traveled through. Families allowed in as their immigration cases progress will face curfews and GPS monitoring.

(snip)

“I hope it’s a little better and that the appointments are streamlined a little more,” said Yeremy Depablos, 21, a Venezuelan traveling with seven cousins who has been waiting in the city for a month. Fearing deportation, Depablos did not want to cross illegally. “We have to do it the legal way.”

The legal pathways touted by the administration consist of a program that permits up to 30,000 people a month from Haiti, Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela to enter if they apply online with a financial sponsor and enter through an airport.

About 100 processing centers are opening in Guatemala, Colombia and elsewhere for migrants to apply to go to the U.S., Spain or Canada. Up to 1,000 can enter daily through land crossings with Mexico if they snag an appointment on the app.

(snip)

I.e., you have many who are trying to do it "the right way" so they aren't essentially permanently banned from trying again.

[UTUSN]

4. K&R