Due to an extended period of staff travel and commitments, we are producing “Daily Border Links” posts less regularly between May 3 and July 19. We will be unable to post Daily Border Links at all between May 3 and May 17. Following this period, Daily Border Links will again be “daily,” with minor interruptions, between July 22 and the end of the year.
Developments
The chief of Border Patrol’s San Diego Sector—the westernmost of the agency’s nine U.S.-Mexico border sectors—reported that agents there apprehended 10,023 migrants during the week of April 24-30. That cements San Diego’s status as the border’s busiest sector, a position it has not held since the late 1990s.
- Chief Patrol Agent Patricia D. McGurk-Daniel @USBPChiefSDC on Twitter (Twitter, May 1, 2024).
Border Patrol agents had already been making asylum seekers wait for hours or days in the open air at the sector’s California borderline before being able to process them. Now, the Washington Examiner’s Anna Giaritelli reported based on a leaked internal document, some migrants are hiking into rural California seeking to turn themselves in directly to Border Patrol stations or other law enforcement facilities.
- Anna Giaritelli, “Illegal Immigrants Hiking Miles Into California in Search of Police as Border Patrol Is Stretched Thin” (The Washington Examiner, May 1, 2024).
A letter from 32 Democratic members of Congress urged House appropriators to avoid funding any federal government activities that involve collaboration with the Texas state government’s “Operation Lone Star.” The letter noted that “groups have documented repeated cases of Border Patrol turning over migrants to Texas state law enforcement instead of processing them for immigration purposes and ensuring they have access to legal protections for those fleeing violence and danger.”
- Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), “Congressmen Greg Casar, Joaquin Castro, & Colleagues Are Urging Federal Agencies to Not Participate in Operation Lone Star” (U.S. House of Representatives, May 1, 2024).
In leaked audio of a phone conversation with Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham complained that Border Patrol is focusing resources on seizing state-licensed cannabis at interior checkpoints. “They’re saying that they’re worried about fentanyl. So they’re taking all of our cannabis,” the governor was heard saying. “For the love of God, put them at the border in Sunland Park [west of El Paso] where I don’t have a single Border Patrol agent, not one. And people pour over, and so I’m cranky with the secretary.”
- Tommy Lopez, “Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham Heard Voicing Frustration Over Border Issue in Phone Call” (KOB (Albequerque New Mexico), May 2, 2024).
Analyses and Feature Stories
A report from Human Rights Watch detailed how rules mandating use of the CBP One app restrict access to asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border, forcing many to wait for months in precarious and vulnerable conditions inside Mexico. The report included examples of people kidnapped for ransom by Mexican criminal groups while awaiting appointments. CBP personnel, it found, routinely turn asylum seekers away from ports of entry, even when they say they are in danger, because they did not use the app to make appointments. The report called on DHS to stop making the app’s use mandatory and instead increase processing capacity at border ports of entry, while increasing adjudication capacity to reduce asylum case backlogs.
- “‘We Couldn’t Wait’ Digital Metering at the Us-Mexico Border” (Human Rights Watch, May 1, 2024).
- Thomas Graham, “Us Asylum App Strands Migrants and Aids Organised Crime, Rights Group Says” (The Guardian (Uk), May 1, 2024).
- Sandra Sanchez, “Report: ‘Fundamental’ Asylum Rights Denied by Cbp One App” (Border Report, May 1, 2024).
“The Right Way,” a video produced by ProPublica and the Texas Tribune, profiled a Venezuelan family who had to wait for five months in Ciudad Juárez for a CBP One appointment, during the 2023 period when 40 migrants died in a detention center fire in the city.
- Gerardo del Valle, ““the Right Way”: From Venezuela to Juarez and New York to Denver, One Family’s Asylum Journey” (Propublica, Texas Tribune, ProPublica, May 2, 2024).
An article by the Migration Policy Institute evaluated the Title 42 pandemic expulsions policy, which expired a year ago on May 11. Despite nearly 3 million expulsions, it found, migration at the U.S.-Mexico border reached new highs during the 38 months that the policy was in place. The report debunked claims that bringing back Title 42 or a similar “asylum shutdown” policy would deter or significantly reduce irregular migration: “While Title 42 offers a campaign-style slogan to shut down the border, the reality is that it never met that promise. And whatever outcomes it had came at the very sizeable cost of reneging on decades of U.S. commitments to guaranteeing humanitarian protection.”
- Julian Montalvo, Kathleen Bush-Joseph, Muzaffar Chishti, “Title 42 Postmortem: U.S. Pandemic-Era Expulsions Policy Did Not Shut Down the Border” (Migration Policy Institute, May 1, 2024).
On the Right
- Michael Lee, “Mexico’s Migrant Bussing Spree a Lifeline for Biden on Border Crisis: Expert” (Fox News, May 1, 2024).