Latest Border Closure Extension Between U.S., Canada, Mexico Marks Over 1 Year Since Initial Order

02/23/2021

Source: Travel & Leisure

The land border closure between the U.S., Canada, and Mexico has been extended another month until at least March 21, marking over a year since they were open, according to the Department of Homeland Security.

“To protect our citizens and prevent the further spread of COVID-19, the United States, Canada, and Mexico are extending the restrictions on non-essential travel at our land borders through March 21,” the DHS tweeted Friday. “We are also working to ensure essential trade and travel remain open.”

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Asylum seekers waiting in Mexico rattled by delays to US entry

02/23/2021

Source: Al Jazeera

The United States has abruptly cancelled plans to bring asylum seekers into Texas at two ports of entry, dashing the hopes of hundreds who have been waiting for months in Mexico under a Trump-era policy President Joe Biden promised to unwind.

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement on Monday that “given current operational considerations”, it could no longer say when it would begin bringing in migrants through ports in Brownsville and El Paso, Texas.

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U.S. to admit asylum seekers from hard-hit camp at Texas border

02/24/2021

Source: Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The United States this week will begin processing people held in the Matamoros migrant camp at the Texas border for entry into the country after the area was hit hard by severe weather, the Department of Homeland Security said on Wednesday.

The camp, across the Rio Grande from Brownsville, Texas, is home to about 1,000 migrants, most from Central America, hoping to be granted refuge across the border. They have endured sub-zero temperatures over the last week while living in flimsy tents.

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US unwinds Trump policy making asylum-seekers wait in Mexico

02/19/2021

Source: PBS

SAN DIEGO (AP) — The Biden administration moved to restore the asylum system to the way it worked for decades Friday by releasing a group of asylum-seekers into the United States, ending their long wait in Mexico and unraveling one of former President Donald Trump’s signature immigration policies.

The 25 people who arrived are the first of an estimated 25,000 asylum-seekers with active cases in the “Remain in Mexico” program who will now wait in the U.S. for their court hearings instead of south of the border. Wary of a surge of migrants, American officials are warning people not to come to the border and to register on a website that the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees launched Friday.

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US lets in asylum-seekers stuck in Mexico, ends Trump policy

02/19/2021

Source: The Associated Press

SAN DIEGO (AP) — After waiting months and sometimes years in Mexico, people seeking asylum in the United States are being allowed into the country starting Friday as they wait for courts to decide on their cases, unwinding one of the Trump administration’s signature immigration policies that President Joe Biden vowed to end.

The number of asylum-seekers coming in initially will be very limited, beginning Friday at a border crossing in San Diego and expanding to Brownsville, Texas, on Monday and El Paso, Texas, next Friday. U.S. officials are warning people not to come to the U.S.-Mexico border, saying an estimated 25,000 people with active cases in the “Remain in Mexico” program and several hundred who are appealing decisions should register on a website that the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees is launching early next week.

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Mexican president to visit border city, discuss security

02/17/2021

Source: WAVY

TIJUANA (Border Report) — Mexico President Andrés Manuel López Obrador will visit Tijuana on Saturday to discuss security in this corner of Mexico where more than 2,000 murders were recorded last year.

López Obrador, referred to by many in Mexico as AMLO, will also cut the ribbon and inaugurate a National Guard armory in Tijuana.

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Mexico Blames U.S. as Energy Crisis Spills Across the Border

02/16/2021

Source: Yahoo! News

(Bloomberg) — If President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador was looking for ammunition in his quest to cut Mexico’s reliance on foreign energy, it would be hard to top the electricity blackouts affecting the north of the country.

Mexico reported 4.77 million homes and businesses losing power Monday after imports of natural gas from the U.S. were curbed, knocking power stations offline.

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Asylum seekers stuck in Mexico are frustrated, angry over Biden administration’s release of some migrants into U.S.

02/12/2021

Source: The Washington Post

MATAMOROS, Mexico — Cuban asylum seeker Yuleydis Caballero has been living in a migrant tenement in this border town for nearly 18 months, waiting for her day in a U.S. immigration court under the Trump administration’s “remain in Mexico” policy. So when she learned that families that recently crossed the border illegally have been released in the United States under the new Biden administration, Caballero’s anger boiled over.

“They tell us to be patient, be patient, be patient. But from where do they want us to draw patience? We have nothing left,” Caballero said. “We don’t understand why Trump was able to change policy one day to the next, but a new president can’t change our situation one day to the next.”

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Mexico has stopped accepting some Central American families ‘expelled’ by U.S. along the border

2/3/2021

Source: The Washington Post

The Mexican government has stopped taking back Central American families “expelled” at the U.S. border under a Trump-era emergency health order related to the coronavirus, a shift that has prompted U.S. Customs and Border Protection to release more parents and children into the U.S. interior, according to five U.S. officials.

The change, which has not been publicly disclosed, raises concerns in U.S. border communities and at the Department of Homeland Security because the large-scale release of parents and children into the United States has triggered previous waves of unauthorized migration.

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Border Patrol Releases More Migrants Into U.S. After Mexico Stops Taking Some Back

2/4/21

Source: The Wall Street Journal

U.S. Border Patrol agents are increasingly releasing asylum-seeking families into the U.S. after Mexican authorities began refusing to take some families back in January, U.S. officials said.

In recent weeks, an influx of families arriving along parts of the border has filled some holding facilities, where capacity has been reduced in response to the Covid-19 pandemic, Customs and Border Protection said in a statement.

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