Border crossings at the southern border declined in June, almost a month after the Biden administration implemented new policies that restrict asylum applications and, in turn, result in the deaths of dozens of migrants who, despite the obstacles, try to reach the United States. Border Patrol arrests reached their lowest level in three years, since Joe Biden arrived at the White House, and June emerges as the fourth consecutive month of decreased arrests on the border with Mexico.
Although Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has not released official apprehension figures for June, a Department of Homeland Security official told NBC News that Border Patrol agents apprehended just over 84,000 migrants last month, down 30% from May, when the number of apprehensions was just over 117,000.
On the one hand, the Democratic administration, which is under strong political pressure to stop the flow across the border, claims that the decrease in illegal crossings is due to the measure signed on June 4, which empowers U.S. authorities to close the border to migrants seeking asylum if illegal crossings exceed 2,500 per day. In his recent presidential debate, where the issue of immigration was essential, Biden boasted that, after the change in his immigration laws, 40% fewer people are crossing the border illegally.
U.S. officials told NBC News that the decline in numbers is also due to high temperatures in the summer months, which have surpassed 100 degrees Fahrenheit (40 degrees Celsius), and the role Mexican authorities have played in stemming the flow of migrants. The government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador has recently cracked down on deportations from the south of the country and taken other steps to stem waves of migrants traveling by train, bus or through airports. Earlier this year, both Biden and López Obrador said their national security advisers would work “together to immediately implement concrete measures to significantly reduce irregular border crossings while protecting human rights.”
Biden’s restrictive policies and deaths at the southern border
In January 2021, the month Biden took office as president of the United States, the lowest numbers of illegal crossings were reported so far. It was the last time they were below 97,000, when the Border Patrol detained about 75,000 migrants. Until Biden implemented his new policy, irregular crossings amounted to about 4,000 per day, according to figures from the Department of Homeland Security. Since the beginning of June, after the measure announced by the president, asylum processes can be suspended if the number of illegal crossings in the last seven days exceeds 2,500, and they can be resumed when they are below 1,500, a number, according to them, manageable so that the authorities can process the applicants.
Speaking to reporters, Undersecretary for Border and Immigration Policy Blas Núñez-Neto said that these measures “are much stronger than those previously taken based on the presidential proclamation suspending the entry of people at the border.” “The changes in how we are going to process people are going to result in the almost immediate expulsion of the vast majority of people found at the border,” he insisted. Núñez-Neto explained that there are exceptions to these policies, especially for children, medical emergencies, victims of trafficking, or people who are in a life-threatening situation.
Biden’s measures, which will give him points ahead of the November elections, have also been heavily criticized by activists who claim that they are policies that leave many people unprotected and put their lives at risk, while violating international laws on refuge and protection for people fleeing hostile contexts. The restrictions, as happened in the past with the so-called Title 42, could encourage migrants to cross the border illegally repeatedly, and expose their lives to the dangers that this entails.
In fact, the results have already begun to be seen. Some activists, according to data from the Border Patrol and press reports, have said that at least 25 migrants have died in the desert or drowned in canals in the last four weeks, fleeing operations in Mexican territory and amid restrictive measures by the United States Government. According to the EFE agency, representatives of civil organizations in Ciudad Juárez said that last Wednesday, four people died in the American desert of El Paso, Texas, and another person was found drowned in the canal in that city. Other bodies were found on May 31 in the desert of New Mexico.
Even so, with just a few months to go before the presidential elections, the front-runners have yet to come up with a solution for the millions of undocumented immigrants, and are debating who is best at stopping the flow of migrants across the border. While Biden assured in the first debate that he will continue “moving forward with what we can do with more Border Patrol and more asylum officers,” Donald Trump criminalized migrants by calling them “murderers” or “criminals,” and insisted that “we have to get many of these people out, and we have to get them out quickly, because they are going to destroy our country.”
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