US Starts Expelling Venezuelan Migrants to Mexico Under New Rules
(Bloomberg) -- The US started to expel Venezuelans to Mexico under new rules implemented by the Biden administration aimed at stemming the flow of migrants fleeing a decimated economy and crossing the US border without authorization.
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Roughly 100 people were taken from a detention center in El Paso, Texas, flown to another part of the border and left on an international bridge near Matamoros, Mexico, on Thursday, according to people in the group. The expulsion came a day after the US authorities announced the measures, which couple a humanitarian parole program with an expansion of a pandemic-era border policy known as Title 42.
Some of the migrants were attempting to cross back into the US on Friday, said Luis Conde, a 43-year-old topographer who was in the group. Conde arrived in the US on Oct. 9, days before the new rules were announced.
“They rounded us up without explanation. Now we don’t know what to do,” he said by telephone.
Other Venezuelans shared videos on social media after they said they had been removed from the US, leaving them in limbo on the Mexico side of the border.
US Customs and Border Protection didn’t respond immediately to a request for comment on the number of Venezuelans who had been sent back to Mexico.
In Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Ciela Avila, who works at Derechos Humanos Integrales en Accion, a migrant aid group, said there was not enough space in the city’s shelters for the hundreds of Venezuelans who had arrived since Wednesday plus the thousands more expected.
“Where are there safe and dignified conditions for these people?” she said. “They’re just giving them a notice that they should leave Mexico in 15 days.”
US officials this year have had encounters with more than 128,000 Venezuelan migrants at the US-Mexico border, an increase of at least 166% from the same period last year.
President Joe Biden’s administration implemented the measures in an attempt to deter Venezuelans from trying to cross the border without authorization. They consist of a humanitarian parole program for as many as 24,000 people who have a financial sponsor in the US, coupled with the extension of Title 42, which was used by the Trump administration to stop the spread of Covid-19.
On Thursday, authorities said they would begin turning away Venezuelans who arrived at the border. Blas Nunez-Neto, acting assistant US Homeland Security secretary for border and immigration policy, said those who were en route to the US should “stay where they are. Do not try to enter Mexico and do not try to cross our border.” Title 42, he said, supersedes their right to claim asylum.
A collapse in the Venezuelan economy has forced some 7 million residents to flee the country in recent years. While the vast majority have fled to other Latin American countries, deteriorating conditions have prompted a record number to attempt to make the journey to the US this year, often crossing an inhospitable stretch of jungle at the Panama-Colombia border.
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