The moves are part of a plan by the administration of President Joe Biden to end the program, known as the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), an effort complicated by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and concerns over illegal immigration.

The Trump administration launched the program in 2019 as part of a wide-ranging crackdown on the ability to seek asylum in the United States, which Trump officials depicted as rife with fraud and meritless claims.

The initiative forced more than 65,000 non-Mexican asylum seekers back across the border to wait for their U.S. court hearings, although far fewer are believed to still be waiting in Mexico.

The Biden administration will begin by working to process about 25,000 migrants with active claims in the program, officials said on Thursday. The new guidelines will require migrants to register online or via phone, be tested for the coronavirus in Mexico and then come to a U.S. port of entry on a specific day.

The news was welcomed with relief in a sprawling migrant camp in the Mexican city of Matamoros, just across the border from Brownsville, Texas.

“I’ve been reading all the articles,” said Salvadoran asylum seeker Sandra Andrade, who has been waiting in Mexico for over a year to resolve her U.S. court case. “Honestly, I have no words for how I’m feeling right now!”

Biden vowed on the campaign trail to roll back restrictive Trump-era immigration policies, including MPP, which is informally known as “remain in Mexico.” His administration suspended new entries into the program when he took office on Jan. 20, but did not immediately put forward a plan to bring the people enrolled in it into the United States. Some have been waiting for as long as two years.

Republicans embracing Trump’s hardline immigration views have criticized the ending of MPP and could use it as fuel for political attacks if illegal border crossings increase on Biden’s watch.

Top Biden officials have stressed in recent weeks that migrants should not attempt to enter the United States, saying they need time to build up the capacity to process more asylum seekers.

“Individuals who are not eligible under this initial phase should wait for further instructions and not travel to the border,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement accompanying the MPP announcement. “Due to the current pandemic, restrictions at the border remain in place and will be enforced.”

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador echoed that message on Friday, saying migrants should not think “the gates of the northern border are open” or believe human smugglers who say as much.

During a call with reporters on Thursday evening, three Biden administration officials described the plans to process MPP enrollees, with the first phase beginning on Feb. 19.

The officials, all of whom requested anonymity, only outlined procedures for people with active cases in U.S. immigration courts. Those with non-active cases, many of whom may have returned to their home countries, “will have other opportunities,” one of the officials said.

Under the plan, migrants will need to register with international organizations over the internet or by phone and await instructions. One of the organizations will also handle coronavirus testing in Mexico, another official said.

Biden officials declined to identify the organizations on Thursday. However, a spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said the refugee agency would work with both the U.S. and Mexican governments to ensure migrants in the program could safely enter the United States.

STARTING SMALL

The migrants’ claims will initially be heard at three ports of entry along the border, with organizations working to identify those in line the longest and those deemed particularly vulnerable.

At two of the ports, the Biden administration expects to process 300 people per day at each port. The effort will expand to additional ports over time.

“We will start small,” said one of the officials.

The Biden officials declined to name the ports where the administration planned to begin processing, citing concerns that people would rush to those locations.

Migrants entering the United States through the program will not be placed in detention centers, but could be subject to an alternative form of monitoring, including ankle bracelets.

The United States developed the strategy in close coordination with Mexican authorities, the official said.

Even while Biden moves to end one Trump program, he faces growing pressure from advocates to end another known as Title 42. The pandemic-era order allows U.S. authorities to rapidly expel to Mexico migrants caught crossing the border illegally, a practice advocates say bypasses due process.

The Biden administration has not said whether it will end that program. More than 400,000 migrants have been expelled under the measure since it became effective in March 2020, although many of those caught are repeat border crossers and therefore counted multiple times.

The effort to process MPP enrollees comes as arrests of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border have been increasing after a steep drop at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

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US President Joe Biden in the Oval Office of the White House on January 25, 2021. (JIM WATSON / AFP)

In his first week in office, US President Joe Biden has spent a considerable amount of time on the phone with other world leaders.

He has called London, dialed Berlin, and rang Moscow.

But as of Thursday morning Washington time, the new leader of the free world had yet to phone Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or any Middle Eastern leader for that matter.

This is a marked departure from Biden’s two predecessors, Donald Trump and Barack Obama, who both spoke to Netanyahu and other regional partners in their initial round of calls.

The calls, or lack thereof, are not necessarily a sign of any particular tension or problem between the countries or between the leaders themselves. But a look at who Biden has been speaking to long-distance can provide some insight into the new president’s global priorities.

For better or worse, Israel is not among them.

Long-distance relationship

Biden’s first phone calls after the inauguration went to America’s neighbors.

His January 22 call with Canadian PM Justin Trudeau, Biden’s first as president, came after Trudeau expressed disappointment over Biden’s move to cancel the controversial Keystone XL pipeline.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at a news conference, January 8, 2020 in Ottawa. (Dave Chan / AFP)

Biden’s next call that day went to Mexico’s Andrés Manuel López Obrador. The Mexican leader, known by his nickname “AMLO”, had developed a close personal bond with Trump, and was one of the last world leaders to congratulate Biden on his victory. The phone call was an attempt to open a new page between the leaders, who will have to cope with confounding issues like trade and immigration.

Biden’s shifted his focus to Europe in his second round of calls. On January 23, he spoke with UK leader Boris Johnson, who also had a good working relationship with Trump. He spoke with French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel over the next two days, both leaders who were doubtless relieved by Biden’s expressions of support for NATO and the US commitment to collective defense in Europe.

The messages underlined his promise to reverse Trump’s stance on NATO and its role as a bulwark against Russia. The ex-president was not averse to publicly haranguing NATO members to spend more on defense, and some reports indicated he had pondered withdrawing from the alliance.

The message was driven home on Tuesday with a call to NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, in which Biden pledged to “rebuild and reestablish our alliances, starting with NATO.”

In a rare move emphasizing the importance with which the new administration views the organization, the White House and NATO released a joint video of the call.

After making his support clear for America’s European partners, Biden turned to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Under Trump, the rhetoric around the US-Russia relationship was usually positive, but in practice, ties have reached a post-Soviet nadir.

The White House readout of the call stressed the new tone coming out of Washington, pointing out that Biden raised with Putin concerns over “the SolarWinds hack, reports of Russia placing bounties on United States soldiers in Afghanistan, interference in the 2020 United States election, and the poisoning of Aleksey Navalny.”

“President Biden made clear that the United States will act firmly in defense of its national interests in response to actions by Russia that harm us or our allies. The two presidents agreed to maintain transparent and consistent communication going forward.”

If the phone calls are a guide, the central thrust of Biden’s foreign policy out of the gate seems clear: Focus on trade and immigration with neighbors, deal firmly with Russia, and work through NATO partners while strengthening the alliance.

“This is about consolidating relationships at home, and with our most trusted allies across the Atlantic,” said Jonathan Schanzer, Senior Vice President at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. “One gets the sense that we’re addressing immediate domestic needs, and then from there looking to shore up the EU after four years of fairly tumultuous relationships, and then NATO, which has been somewhat rocky because of Trump’s pressure on a lot of these countries.”

Making a different call

Trump also made calls to the leaders of Mexico, Germany, France, and Russia within the first eight days of entering office.

But all those calls came after a conversation with Netanyahu on Trump’s third day in office. According to Netanyahu’s office, the conversation was “very warm,” and the two leaders discussed the Iran deal, the peace process, and “other issues” including an invitation to visit Washington.

Other initial calls Trump made were less pleasant. Instead of the traditional courteous — and rather bland — conversations that leaders have come to expect, Trump laid into traditional allies. He reportedly lambasted Australian PM Malcolm Turnbull over a deal the Obama administration had signed that would allow refugees from an Australian detention center into the US.

“This is the worst deal ever,” Trump told Turnbull.

US President Donald Trump (right) with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prior to Trump’s departure to Rome, at Ben Gurion International Airport, May 23, 2017. (Kobi Gideon / GPO via Flash90)

Trump’s phone calls, both when they came and what they contained, turned out to be a reliable bellwether of his foreign policy.

He went beyond previous US administrations in his support for Israel, moving America’s embassy to Jerusalem, recognizing Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights, and defunding UN agencies both countries see as biased against the Jewish state.

He also focused on traditional American allies in Europe during his four years in office, but with a new message, taking them to task publicly and privately over their perceived unwillingness to contribute their fair share in maintaining a military deterrent against Russia.

Obama also set the tone with the phone calls he made in his first days in office. He kicked things off with calls to the Middle East on his first day in office, speaking to Egyptian, Israeli, Jordanian, and Palestinian Authority leaders. The Palestinians claim that the first call went to PA President Mahmoud Abbas.

The calls may have reflected world events happening then. Obama took office only two days after Israel ended Operation Cast Lead in Gaza (the timing of Israel’s withdrawal was probably no coincidence). Over one thousand Palestinian combatants and civilians died in the conflict, and it was certainly a pressing issue on Obama’s agenda.

But Obama’s phone calls were also an indication of his administration’s desire to bring a new approach to vexing problems in the Middle East. Like Biden, he promised to re-engage with the international community following eight years of George W. Bush. But unlike Biden, the focus of his effort was the Middle East, not Europe.

The president visited Turkey and Iraq in April 2009, then Saudi Arabia and Egypt in June. He gave two speeches, one in Ankara and one in Cairo, offering “a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect.”

US President Barack Obama speaks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in January 2012. (Peter Souza/White House/File)

But the administration’s focus on the Middle East proved a challenge for Israel’s leadership. Netanyahu butted heads with Obama over settlements, peace talks with the Palestinians, the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and most prominently, Iran’s nuclear program.

The personal animus between the leaders was on full display during joint press conferences, and Netanyahu’s speech before Congress assailing the impending nuclear deal with Iran infuriated the president and many in his party.

Take a message

Netanyahu can breathe a sigh of relief that he wasn’t in Biden’s first round of calls. Though the relationship between the leaders is expected to be warmer than those during Obama’s tenure, Biden was never going to be as aligned with Netanyahu’s priorities as Trump was.

With clear differences of opinion over the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and settlements, the best Netanyahu can hope for right now is an American focus on domestic issues like the economy and COVID-19, and on Russia and China in the international sphere.

That’s not to say the Biden administration has blocked out the region entirely. US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken is already deep in the weeds on dealing with Iran and has held talks with his Israeli counterpart Gabi Ashkenazi. On Thursday, Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, the head of the US Central Command, visited Israel, in what some have seen as a message to Tehran.

But what the commander in chief does sets the agenda. And so far, Biden has shown that he is in no rush to spend energy or political capital on the Middle East. He has signed a record 22 executive orders in his first week in office, none of which have anything directly to do with Middle East policy. His inaugural speech, 22 minutes long, dedicated only two sentences to foreign policy at all.

“We will repair our alliances and engage with the world once again,” he promised from the dais. “Not to meet yesterday’s challenges, but today’s and tomorrow’s challenges.”

US President Joe Biden speaks after being sworn in as the 46th President of the US, at the US Capitol in Washington, January 20, 2021. (Patrick Semansky/Pool/AFP)

That was it. Nothing on Iran, nothing on the peace process, nothing on the Middle East.

Biden’s turn away from the Middle East is a continuation of broader trends in American public opinion and in the threats the country faces.

America became deeply involved — many would say bogged down — in the Middle East after the September 11, 2001 attacks. As the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq turned into insurgencies and America’s death toll mounted, voters began to ask why American blood and treasure was being wasted in far-flung countries, especially with pressing problems at home. Obama began reducing America’s military commitment to the region, and Trump accelerated the process. There is currently no appetite among US leaders from either party to invest significant resources in the Middle East.

In addition, the US has recognized that the most pressing international threats it faces are not from Islamic terrorism, but from Russia and China. This view is evident in American strategic documents, including the 2018 National Defense Strategy.

“The central challenge to US prosperity and security is the reemergence of long-term, strategic competition by what the National Security Strategy classifies as revisionist powers,” it reads. “It is increasingly clear that China and Russia want to shape a world consistent with their authoritarian model — gaining veto authority
over other nations’ economic, diplomatic, and security decisions.”

US military forces are being designed and structured to face a multi-domain threat from near-peer adversaries like Russia and China.

Still, the Middle East has a way of overtaking world events and insinuating itself into the agenda of US presidents. Eventually, a call will come, but until then, one doubts that Netanyahu will be sitting by the phone waiting for it.

Source: https://www.timesofisrael.com/bidens-first-phone-calls-show-where-hes-looking-and-its-not-at-israel/

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MEXICO CITY — For generations, Mexico served as a relatively open thruway for undocumented migrants traveling to the United States. Tens of thousands crossed the country every year, mostly unimpeded by the Mexican authorities.

But the Mexican government’s new hard-line posture on migration entered a new phase this week with its iron-fisted response to a large migrant caravan of Central Americans who sought to enter Mexico.

The Mexican government effectively dismantled the caravan at the nation’s southern border in recent days, using a combination of carrots and sticks — the lure of possible employment for those who chose to enter legally, and pepper spray, detention, and deportation for those who did not.

By Friday, a caravan that had numbered as many as 4,000 a week ago had dwindled to several dozen, most of them languishing in Ciudad Tecún Umán in Guatemala, where they were considering their dashed hopes and next moves. More than 1,000 were sent back to Honduras and another 800 or so remained in detention in Mexico, government authorities said.

“I didn’t cross because I saw the difficulties,” said Rony Benitez, 49, a bus driver from Honduras, who was sitting on a sidewalk in Tecún Umán on Friday morning. “I’m done with the caravan.”

Mexican security forces dressed in riot gear massed at the border with Guatemala on Monday.Credit…Johan Ordonez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The caravan was perhaps the biggest and most dramatic test to date of Mexico’s new resolve to get tough on illegal migration. The policy shift began last year under pressure from President Trump, who threatened to close the border and impose tariffs, demanding that the Mexican government do more to curb the flow of migrants passing through its territory on their way to the United States.

The crackdown led to intense scenes this week of Mexican security forces dressed in riot gear repelling or rounding up Central American migrants who tried to cross Mexico’s southern border en masse.

The tactics drew the criticism of immigrants’ advocates and even some Mexican officials who accused the authorities of committing human rights violations by using excessive force. But the Trump administration applauded the efforts, congratulating the Mexican government for its tougher line on migration.

Kenneth T. Cuccinelli II, the acting deputy Homeland Security secretary, told reporters on Friday that the Trump administration had seen more cooperation from Mexico, as well as from El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala, “than anyone thought was possible.”

He said the enforcement was partly the result of the diversion of dozens of Homeland Security agents to the region to train local authorities to stop migration to the United States. He added that next week the administration would begin carrying out a deal with Honduras to deport asylum-seekers back to Honduras.

For his part, President   of Mexico defended his government’s response to the caravan and said its security forces had respected human rights and acted with professionalism.

“The problem has been resolved well,” he said during a news conference on Friday. “Fortunately, human rights have been respected.”

The Mexican administration’s response to the caravan was a sharp departure from its approach to similar mass migrations just a year ago.

Mr. López Obrador took office in December 2018 amid a surge in migration from Central America, as thousands fled poverty, violence and government dysfunction and sought to reach the southwest border of the United States.

But instead of impeding that flow, Mr. López Obrador, a lifelong populist, and champion of the poor, opened the door even wider, promising work opportunities in Mexico and distributing yearlong humanitarian visas to just about anyone who applied.

As he rejected what he called the enforcement-first approach of his predecessors, deportations from Mexico plummeted.

But the permissiveness seemed to encourage even more migration, angering Mr. Trump, who threatened Mexico with crippling tariffs and the closure of the United States-Mexico border. In response, Mexico began cracking down on illegal migration, sharply increasing the detentions of undocumented migrants.

At the same time, Mr. Trump also compelled his counterparts in Central America to step up their enforcement efforts and pressured the Northern Triangle countries — Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador — to sign agreements requiring migrants who passed through one of those countries to first seek asylum there before applying in the United States.

Migrants in a caravan carried banners and an American flag after crossing the Suchiate River from Ciudad Tecún Umán, Guatemala, to Ciudad Hidalgo, Mexico.Credit…Alfredo Estrella/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

As a result of these measures, northbound migration through Mexico to the United States border has ebbed considerably in recent months.

But this wave of increasingly restrictive policies throughout the region did not discourage the latest migrant caravan from forming.

Its members, traveling on foot and hitchhiking, set off early last week from the city of San Pedro Sula in northern Honduras. The group grew in size as it headed north through Guatemala.

As the caravan approached the Mexican border, the Mexican authorities issued warnings that illegal crossings would not be tolerated and urged the migrants to register at official border crossings. Mr. López Obrador also dangled the possibility of employment for those who seek to enter legally, saying that there were 4,000 jobs in Mexico’s southern region that needed to be filled.

While some of the caravan’s participants presented themselves at legal border crossings, thousands more grew frustrated with the bottlenecks and sought to cross by other means, setting up a series of confrontations with the Mexican authorities.

On Jan. 18, hundreds of migrants in the vanguard of the caravan surged across a bridge linking the Guatemalan city of Tecún Umán with the Mexican city of Ciudad Hidalgo and came face to face with troops from Mexico’s National Guard, who blocked their path.

A full-blown melee erupted as the migrants tried to break through the Mexican defenses and the National Guard forces pushed back with riot shields and pepper spray.

Migrants charged at Mexican security forces at the border crossing last weekend.Credit…Marco Ugarte/Associated Press

As tensions settled, 20 migrants at a time were permitted to enter and register with the Mexican migration authorities. But some became angry, and others despaired when they found out that the Mexican government intended to send most of those who registered back to their countries of origin.

Two days later, more than 1,000 migrants tried to force their way from Guatemala into Mexico by fording a river that separates the two countries and storming up a steep riverbank before being repelled by Mexican security forces wielding riot shields and truncheons.

Though some of the migrants sneaked through the security phalanx, most scrambled back into Guatemala.

A third showdown — and perhaps the final blow for the migrant caravan — came on Thursday, when about 1,000 migrants crossed the border illegally and started walking toward the city of Tapachula. Hours later, they were cut off and surrounded by roughly 200 members of Mexico’s security forces, who used pepper spray to subdue those who resisted or tried to flee.

Migrants scuffled with Mexican security forces on Thursday at the border with Guatemala.Credit…Alfredo Estrella/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The migrants were eventually forced onto buses and taken to detention centers.

The Mexican authorities said that the more than 1,000 migrants who have been returned to Honduras had gone voluntarily. It was unclear whether the roughly 800 who were in detention were facing deportation, or whether they would be allowed to stay while they petitioned for asylum or another kind of immigration relief.

At least 1,800 members of the caravan had registered at official border crossings, government officials said, while hundreds of others were thought to have made it into Mexico’s interior. Some who were part of the caravan never left Guatemala and instead turned around and went home, officials said.

Mr. López Obrador said Friday that many in the caravan had been “tricked” into believing that passage into Mexico was going to be easier.

“They were told that they were going to pass through the national territory without a problem,” he said.

Kirk Semple reported from Mexico City, and Brent McDonald from Ciudad Hidalgo, Mexico, and Ciudad Tecún Umán, Guatemala. Sofía Menchú contributed reporting from Ciudad Tecún Umán, Guatemala, and Zolan Kanno-Youngs from Washington.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/24/world/americas/migrant-caravan-mexico.html

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