Migration is a human right. Brittany Vogt
U.S. decries rising violence in Central America but will continue deportations
The United States is growing increasingly concerned about rising violence in Central America even as it launches a large-scale effort to round up Central American families and deport them to their home countries. Twice in recent days, senior U.S. officials, including President Barack Obama during his State of the Union address Tuesday, have listed Central America as an area of concern for the coming year, and on Monday, the U.S. suspended the Peace Corps program in El Salvador, citing security concerns. But the U.S. Department of Homeland Security insists it will continue to conduct immigration raids aimed at Central Americans.
US to expand refugee admissions for Central Americans fleeing violence
The US is to expand its refugee programme to help thousands of people fleeing violence in Central America avoid a perilous journey often exploited by human smugglers, secretary of state John Kerry has announced.The office of the UN high commissioner for refugees will now conduct initial screenings to test whether people from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala may qualify as refugees eligible to move to the US legally. The move came after a backlash from Democrats in Congress who urged Barack Obama to halt the deportations of families who have fled drug-fuelled violence, corruption and institutional breakdown in the three countries and entered the US without documentation.
This Is Fear: ICE Raids on Parents and Children
So, this current detain and deport initiative won’t stop the immigration we are largely responsible for, but it will make healthy profits for those banking on it. And it kills immigrants’ and their children’s attempts to become part of local communities. In my town, immigrant parents aren’t walking their kids to the school bus stop, shutters are drawn, life feels on hold. These raids don’t just impact immigrants who have sought refuge in the U.S. in the last year or two. They terrorize families across the country, ensuring that they can never really “arrive.” Even if they have been here for decades, even if kids and spouses are citizens, even if they want nothing more than to settle in and build a life.
Central Americans Picked Up in Raids Get Deportation Pause
The California Democrat said Congress must ensure the families are advised of their rights and provided counsel and that comprehensive immigration reform is the only way to solve the problem of increased illegal immigration. The request for a stay of the families’ deportation was made through the CARA project, which include CLINIC, AILA, American Immigration Council and Refugee and the Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services. Lawyers are meeting with additional families. The Department of Homeland Security targeted migrant families, many of them women and children who had arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border in 2014 when the U.S. saw a spike in migrants from Central America and Mexico. Many were detained after their arrival but the federal government was forced by a court to release them, an order that the Obama administration is appealing.
Central American immigrants scramble for options to deportation by U.S.
Immigration lawyers say a deportation order is not an arrest order and people do not have to open the door to immigration agents. “You have rights,” Mejia said as her 12-year-old son handed the woman fliers about an upcoming legal clinic. Hundreds of families in Chicago could meet the criteria for deportation since the Department of Homeland Security said it was targeting adults and children apprehended at the border and who were allowed into the country but who have now been issued final deportation orders, said Lawrence Benito, executive director of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, an advocacy group.
Tensions escalate further between Obama, Democrats over deportation raids
Immigrant rights advocates have been outraged by the raids, which are the first large-scale effort to deport families who have fled violence in Central America. The Not1More campaign on Tuesday released a parody website asking for proposals for a “Deporter-in-Chief” wing of the Obama presidential library, including an installation about the raids on Central American families that it said have “led to a wave of panic in immigrant communities across the nation.” The nationwide campaign, first reported by The Washington Post, is a key element of the administration’s response to the wave of Central American migrants fleeing drug and gang-related violence, along with poverty. More than 100,000 families with both adults and children have made the journey across the Southwest border since last year, though this migration has largely been overshadowed by a related surge of unaccompanied minors.
Surge in Central American migrants at US border threatens repeat of 2014 crisis
A surge of undocumented children and families from Central America detained at the US border could trigger a repeat of the 2014 migrant crisis just as the presidential campaign gathers pace. Border agents detained 21,469 people travelling in family groups in the last three months of 2015 – almost triple the number held during the same period in 2014, according to new figures released by Borders and Customs Protection. The vast majority were from the northern triangle of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, where authorities are struggling to cope with drug-fuelled violence, corruption and institutional breakdown. The number of unaccompanied children more than doubled to 17,370, compared with just under 7,987 in the last three months of 2014. The apprehension of 6,782 children in December made it the fifth highest month for child detentions on record.
Episode 675: The Cost Of Crossing (Audio)
For some context consider the changes in recent years: Mexican immigrants have actually been leaving America. Meanwhile, Central American immigration is on the rise. This shift caused alarm when unaccompanied children from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala started showing up at the border seeking shelter. A new wave of people were making their way up through Mexico, trying to cross rivers and deserts to escape nightmarish poverty and gang violence. And many of the people doing this were paying dearly for it. Between 2012 and 2014, as the Central American immigration crisis began to boil, our reporter for this episode, Jasmine Garsd, was there in both Mexico and Central America. One thing that caught her attention was the complex financial ecosystem that arose from human smuggling. As drug cartels tightened their grip on Mexico, it got harder and harder for anyone to cross the border without hiring a professional who would protect them and pay off local gang-imposed tolls.
Action Alert: Stop raids to deport Central American families
Resources to respond to deportation raids targeting Central American families