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February 8, 2021
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Migration News: February 8, 2021
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Migrations News
Reuters
The Biden administration said on Saturday it was immediately suspending Trump-era asylum agreements with El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, part of a bid to undo his Republican predecessor’s hardline immigration policies. In a statement, State Department Secretary Antony Blinken said the United States had “suspended and initiated the process to terminate the Asylum Cooperative Agreements with the Governments of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras as the first concrete steps on the path to greater partnership and collaboration in the region laid out by President Biden.”
Silvia Foster-Frau, Arelis R. Hernández, Kevin Sieff and Nick Miroff, The Washington Post
President Biden's more-welcoming message to immigrants is facing an immediate challenge along the Mexican border, where Central American families and children have been crossing in numbers that point to a building crisis. In recent days, U.S. authorities have seen the return of large groups of parents and children crossing the border in the darkness, a replay of scenes that occurred during the record influx of families who arrived in 2018 and 2019, overwhelming migrant shelters and Border Patrol stations.
John Washington, The Intercept
Three Cameroonian asylum-seekers locked up at the Pine Prairie ICE Processing Center in Louisiana say that a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement guard threatened to expose them to Covid-19 if they failed to obey his orders and submit to a transfer. The guard made the threat clear, Clovis Fozao, one of the detained men, told The Intercept: If the detained migrants didn’t submit, they would be transferred to Bravo-Alpha, the detention unit where Covid-19-positive detainees are held in quarantine.
Nick Miroff and Maria Sacchetti, The Washington Post
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is preparing to issue new guidelines to agents this week that could sharply curb arrests and deportations, as the Biden administration attempts to assert more control over an agency afforded wide latitude under President Donald Trump, according to internal memos and emails obtained by The Washington Post. While ICE’s new operational plans are not yet final, interim instructions sent to senior officials point to a major shift in enforcement. Agents will no longer seek to deport immigrants for crimes such as driving under the influence and assault, and will focus instead on national security threats, recent border crossers and people completing prison and jail terms for aggravated felony convictions.
Sabrina Rodriguez, Politico
The Biden administration has begun the process of ending agreements with El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala as part of its effort to undo Trump-era changes to the U.S. asylum system, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced on Saturday. The announcement means the termination of three asylum cooperative agreements that the U.S. signed in 2019 with each of the Central American countries to require migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. to first apply for protections in those countries.
Anthony Orozco, WITF
After President Joe Biden signed three executive orders dealing with immigrant family separation and asylum seekers, activists from Pennsylvania and other states convened Wednesday in Washington D.C. They called on Biden to do away with another immigration policy: one that keeps immigrant families together, but in detention. A group of around 100 activists from about 20 different civic groups convened at Freedom Plaza. A number of groups came from Pennsylvania, in large part because Berks County is home to one of only three family detention centers in the nation. The other two are in Texas.
Lisa Deaderick, The San Diego Union-Tribune
The promises made during President Joe Biden’s campaign last year — and his signing of a number of executive orders last week — have generated relief and hopefulness regarding his administration’s approach to immigration. In comparison to the more restrictive and punitive policies of the Trump administration, immigrant rights advocates and experts seem cautiously optimistic that the president’s U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021 — should it pass — will truly protect and support undocumented immigrants and asylum seekers.
Will Weissert and Nomaan Merchant, Associated Press/Star Tribune
President Joe Biden rushed to send the most ambitious overhaul of the nation's immigration system in a generation to Congress and signed nine executive actions to wipe out some of his predecessor's toughest measures to fortify the U.S.-Mexico border. But a federal court in Texas suspended Biden's 100-day moratorium on deportations, and the immigration bill is likely to be scaled back as lawmakers grapple with major coronavirus pandemic relief legislation as well a second impeachment trial for former President Donald Trump.
AP News/San Francisco Chronicle
The Vermont Department of Health has set up a pop-up clinic in Winooski to vaccinate refugees and immigrants in the area who are aged 75 and older. On Saturday, 50 new Americans received the first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, WCAX-TV reported. It was the second clinic held for these populations.
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