“The Biden administration is scrambling to control the biggest surge in 20 years, with the nation on pace for as many as 2m migrants,” it reads.
But most are expelled under the Title 42 pandemic policy. Here’s how the “Biden Surge™️” looks when you remove expelled migrants:
Is “use the coronavirus crisis to buy time” a euphemism for “keep expelling unaccompanied children?”
Not doing that has been the only actual policy change at the border so far. The administration only had a couple of weeks to prepare for the consequences of that humane choice.
This wasn’t a Biden policy change, or something the USG had control over. Unless “not threatening #Mexico with Trump-style tariffs when Mexico chose to do this” counts as a policy change.
.@JonathanBlitzer’s analysis last week (right) had a far different take on the Trump administration’s cooperativeness in preparing for rising numbers. People on Zoom saying “the numbers will rise” isn’t much in the way of prep—WOLA was saying that too.
1/3 The Washington Post reports tonight on the tragic outcome of taking in migrants without the infrastructure necessary to process and place them humanely.
2/3 At the same time, the New York Times reports tonight on the tragic outcome of _expelling_ migrants due to the lack of infrastructure necessary to process them and consider their protection claims.
3/3 Common thread here is the US's severe lack of infrastructure for protection-seeking migration. 58 days in, can’t fault the Biden administration for that. But it’s their problem now and—sorry for war analogy—we need a blitz of processing, shelters, alternatives to detention.
Let's post a bunch of migration data using CBP and Mexico government numbers.
With 800,000+ apprehended in 11 months, this is the largest apprehensions total since 2007. But unlike 2007, 2 out of 3 are children and parents. In fact, single adults are still trending down. (1/9)
Trump's June tariff threat caused Mexico to increase its own apprehensions, leading to a drop in US apprehensions at the border. But we've seen this before: there were drops after crackdowns and disruptions in 2014 and 2017, and migration recovered after a few months. (2/9)
The crackdown has further increased demand on Mexico's overwhelmed, underfunded asylum system. (3/9)
1/7 Thanks to the White House for publishing the border security "talking-points-memo" that it sent to Congress today, complete with a PowerPoint presentation.
2/7 The statistics on drugs at the border are alarming. But the White House neglects to mention that most are seized at ports of entry, not the spaces between them where a wall might be built.
3/7 These numbers on criminal, gang, or terrorist apprehensions at the border raise more questions than they answer.