Golden Door
There are thousands of migrants, from Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela, and other countries; waiting in Mexico directly outside the United States. They are waiting to cross to make their claim for asylum. They are not US citizens, but they do have “rights”. One of those rights, confirmed both in US law and international treaties, is to enter to claim asylum. Whether US Immigration Courts accept those claims or not isn’t really the issue. The issue is that they have the right to be: “…(T)he homeless, tempest-tost to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door” (New Colossus). They have the ”right” to enter the “golden door”.
Child Separation
President Trump’s administration allowed migrants to cross outside of the “legal” crossing points and then arrested them. They implemented the infamous “child-separation” program. Children crossing with their parents were taken away, based on the “theory” that anyone crossing the border illegally was committing a crime and therefore “unfit” to keep their children. Crossing the border is legally a misdemeanor offense, but it was treated like a “major” felony.
Kids were taken away, and parents imprisoned. It took far too long, but public outrage at the child separation program became deafening. Trump was forced to end it. As many as 2000 children were separated when the program was stopped. Today, years later, 150 kids remain unable to reunite with their loved ones (The Hill).
After the child-separation program ended, the Trump Administration looked for a different way to keep migrants across the border. They took on the Sisyphean task of sealing the border physically to force migrants to only come through legal entry points. They built walls and fences. But as the phrase goes, all it takes to get over a sixteen foot wall is a seventeen foot ladder. And the migrants kept coming.
Title 42
But, since 2020 those migrants who wish to enter legally are blocked. What would be a violation of law and treaty, is allowed under “Title 42”. That’s not an immigration law, or something new passed by Congress. It’s a public health regulation, placed in effect during the pandemic. It closed the borders to prevent the spread of Covid. And while much of the United States, and particularly the anti-vaccine set, are far “over” Covid, many are still in favor of keeping the migrants out. Even though “out” tens of thousands wait across a narrow band of normally fordable water called the Rio Grande River, which makes up much of the US Southern border. (Current Covid death rates in the US, remain at almost 400 per day).
And for those who crossed illegally, instead of being processed, they were simply put on buses and sent back across the border. Title 42 allows the suspension of their due process rights .
The Biden Administration isn’t totally blameless. When Trump imposed “Title 42”, thousands of migrants were stacked up in the border cities across from the US. And while they waited, many more thousands found their way to those same border towns. The inevitable result is that the pressure on the border towns is enormous. Conditions are deteriorating, violence and crime is increasing, and the US has done little to prepare for the “surge” guaranteed when normal border crossings resume. The Administration did try to end Title 42 restrictions, but Republican Governors battled in the Courts to keep the rule in place. Meanwhile the pressure on the border just grows greater.
What Do We Stand For?
The rule was supposed to be lifted yesterday, but Chief Justice John Roberts issued a stay keeping Title 42 rule in place. On the South side of the border, migrants are growing increasingly restless, with rumors of the change in rules stirring everyone up. Should the Supreme Court allow the President to end the health restrictions, no one knows how many thousands will surge through both legal and illegal entry points. And while that surge is completely foreseeable, little has been done to prepare. The cork will be out of the bottle, and no way to clean up the mess.
Even today, migrants who do cross are sleeping on the streets of El Paso and other border towns, because there is nowhere for them to go. Private agencies are completely full, and existing public facilities are packed as well. Just now, FEMA and other Federal agencies are moving in to prepare for the onslaught. Better late than never, but late non-the-less.
And once they arrive, and housing is arranged to keep families together, there is still the question: we are a nation conceived in immigration, built by immigrants, and searching for an increase in the labor force. Will we allow the “homeless and tempest-tost” inside the Golden Door, or will we send them back to the teeming streets of Ciudad Juarez, Tijuana and Matamoros?
Will we simply “refill” the bottle?
