Beaten down by the cold and unsanitary conditions in the encampment, Martinez accepted a free flight back to his homeland of Honduras in January 2020.

Last month, his house was severely damaged by flooding during back-to-back hurricanes. And in January, U.S. President-elect Joe Biden, who has promised to relax some immigration restrictions at the U.S.-Mexico border, takes power. Those factors have prompted Martinez and others to start making plans to return.

Thousands of newly hopeful migrants in Central America have recently joined WhatsApp and Facebook groups dedicated to organizing northbound caravans, slated to begin leaving the region in the coming weeks. Biden’s Jan. 20 inauguration is a frequent topic. “Remember, Trump leaves on the 20th,” one person wrote in a group planning to leave Honduras on Jan. 15. “If people arrive before then, they’ll have problems.”

U.S. border officials and shelter directors along the border are concerned about the effects of a major surge in migration in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, as is the Biden transition team, people familiar with the team’s discussions said.

A new wave of migrants could create an early crisis for the incoming administration as it seeks to fulfill campaign promises to roll back the harsh policies of U.S. President Donald Trump, while still deterring unregulated travel across the southern border.

Reuters spoke with seven shelter organizations, including three of the country’s largest, in Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, and California. Many said they wanted Trump’s policies to be reversed as quickly and safely as possible, but feared pandemic-related factors – including reduced shelter capacity, fewer volunteers and medical workers, a lack of government testing of migrants, and fewer donations – would make it difficult for them to cope with a surge without additional resources.

The Biden campaign website says the new administration will “dramatically increase U.S. government resources to support migrants awaiting assessment of their asylum claims and to the organizations providing for their needs.”

The Biden transition team has been meeting with advocates to listen to suggestions for how to cope with a surge, a source familiar with the discussions told Reuters. Migrant advocates interviewed by Reuters said they have yet to receive concrete commitments from incoming officials.

Biden has promised “on day one” of his administration to end the Migrant Protection Protocols, or MPP, the controversial Trump program implemented in 2019 that forced Martinez and tens of thousands of other asylum seekers to wait in Mexico pending U.S. immigration court hearings.

The Biden transition has not yet said if it plans to repeal a separate COVID-19-related order put in place by the U.S Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in March that allows U.S. authorities to quickly expel almost all border crossers.

On a call with reporters on Monday, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Acting Commissioner Mark Morgan said immediately reversing Trump’s policies on the border would lead to a “full-blown crisis in a couple of weeks.”

Three people familiar with discussions among Biden transition officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that the team recognizes the importance of implementing an orderly process to dismantle MPP to avoid any rush to the border and said unraveling the program will take time.

Another person familiar with the issue said public health concerns regarding the coronavirus will be a key factor in planning how fast to proceed.

VOLUNTEERS ‘DRAMATICALLY REDUCED’

El Paso, Texas-based Annunciation House, one of the country’s largest shelter organizations, took in around 150,000 people from U.S. immigration authorities in fiscal year 2019, director Ruben Garcia said. As many as 1,000 people arrived at its facilities each day during peak times that spring, he said, requiring a “Herculean effort” to respond.

Annunciation House mobilized thousands of volunteers and enlisted churches as makeshift shelters and rented hotel rooms in blocks. Now, Garcia said, “We’re running into the reality that people are saying, ‘Ruben, in this pandemic, there’s just a lot of people who aren’t going to want to help.’” He is facing reluctance from overflow spaces while his own shelters have reduced capacity due to the virus.

Many of Annunciation House’s short-term volunteers are older retirees who are more vulnerable to the coronavirus. At the same time, as the pandemic has hurt jobs and incomes, donations have dropped off. The organization does not receive government support for its work.

Teresa Cavendish, director of the Casa Alitas program that runs a large shelter in Tucson, Arizona, said COVID-19 had “dramatically reduced” the organization’s active roster of 400 volunteers and 150 medical providers because many are vulnerable to the coronavirus, or now have other commitments.

For example, the shelter’s main doctor is now running a COVID-19 ward in a Tucson hospital, she said. The organization has also seen financial donations drop by 75-80%.

Michael Smith, director of The Holding Institute in Laredo, Texas, which helps migrants as well as the local community, said his shelter had lost many volunteers and been forced to introduce new pandemic-related restrictions that have halved its bed capacity.

Donations have also fallen because “in Zoom church, you can’t pass the plate,” he said. He has cut weekly community food distributions from 30 pounds to 25 per household in an effort to stretch resources and is now shopping online for “backup plan” camping tents in case arriving migrants need to sleep outside.

‘NOWHERE TO LIVE’

Garcia, the Annunciation House director, said he wished migrants would “stay put” for a few months as the coronavirus vaccine is rolled out. “It’s going to add an element of manageability that is going to be desperately needed,” he said.

But back in Central America, migrants like Israel Martinez say they cannot wait.

“Look at how sad this is,” Martinez said in a video shot on his cellphone for Reuters as he waded through the streets of his San Pedro Sula neighborhood, still filled with ankle-deep water more than two weeks after the second hurricane made landfall.

The first time he left Honduras, Martinez said, he was fleeing threats from a ruling party politician, who had threatened to jail him for working for the opposition.

Now, with his neighborhood in ruins and shelters for storm victims at capacity, his reasons are simpler.

“I have nowhere to live,” he said in a phone call from an elementary school where he is sleeping with his wife and their six children, aged six to 21. The family is planning to leave for the United States in the first week of January, just before Biden takes office.

The post Biden’s pledges could spur more migration. But in a pandemic, the border is unprepared first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

TUCSON — Two senior Homeland Security officials traveled to southern Arizona Monday to decry censorship and tout the Trump administration’s achievements on border security and immigration, just hours before polls opened in Arizona.

Homeland Security Acting Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli and U.S. Customs and Border Protection Acting Commissioner Mark Morgan took an aerial tour of border wall construction near Sasabe on Monday morning ahead of a news conference at the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson.

Cuccinelli defended his decision to travel for the first time to Arizona, which is considered one of the key battleground states in this presidential election, on the eve of Election Day. He dismissed the idea that his visit served to prop up President Donald Trump and sway voters.

“We don’t stop doing our job because there’s an election coming or going, and this is part of that whole effort,” Cuccinelli said, adding that it was similar to other visits he had undertaken as acting deputy secretary to other border communities.

“I make no apologies for being here. This is my job. It’s part of the commissioner’s job and we’re proud to do it, proud to trumpet what’s been accomplished and recognizing fully there’s plenty more to do,” he added.

During his remarks following the border wall tour, Cuccinelli said the Trump administration’s achievements on border security and immigration can be summed up in three words: “stop, detain and deter.”

The news conference focused mainly on two areas: the construction of physical barriers and the reduction of illegal immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border.

President Donald Trump has been campaigning on the construction of nearly 400 miles of border wall that has gone up under his administration as an example of him keeping the promises he made four years ago. Cuccinelli said an additional 50 miles will be completed by the end of the year.

Arizona is the epicenter of border wall construction. More than 200 miles have been completed or are under construction in the state. That includes about 100 of the 128 miles planned for the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector, which covers the eastern two-thirds of the Arizona border, according to Roy Villareal, the chief patrol agent for the Tucson Sector.

The sun sets over newly built sections of the border wall east of Sasabe, Arizona on 16 September 2020. Rafael Carranza/The Republic

Cuccinelli and Morgan also talked about policies that have reduced the apprehension of undocumented immigrants and asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border. They cited an end to the “catch and release” policy, referring to the process of detaining and then releasing potential asylum seekers into the interior of the U.S. with a notice to appear in court at a later date.

But Morgan acknowledged the policy has not ended completely. In 2019, when a surge in migrant families seeking asylum in the U.S. overwhelmed border agents and officers, CBP released 230,000 migrants from their custody. This year, the number is down 1,000 migrants he said.

They attributed the large reductions in apprehensions to the Trump administration’s agreements with the Mexican government to crack down on the flow of migrants through that country, and to accept more than 68,000 U.S. asylum seekers under the Migrant Protection Protocols, better known as “Remain in Mexico.”

Since March, CBP has been immediately expelling migrants detained at the U.S.-Mexico border during the pandemic under an emergency health order known as Title 42 and ground nearly all asylum processing to a halt.

Morgan warned about the consequences of repealing those policies in a not-so-veiled jab at Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

“If you remove MPP, prematurely end Title 42, and take other actions to stop building the wall, I wanna be clear, it will drive another massive illegal immigration crisis, one that will make last year’s crisis pale in comparison,” he said.

Both Morgan and Cuccinelli decried what they called censorship at the hands of “big tech” companies, with especially pointed words for Twitter, which they accused of arbitrarily suspending Morgan’s account last week for sharing information about border wall construction and arrests of migrants with criminal backgrounds.

“Not everyone trying to enter the country illegally are good. It’s why we need the tools like the wall,” he said. “This is exactly what Twitter didn’t want the American people to hear. Yes, Twitter, walls work, borders matter.”

Despite their claims that their visit was not meant to influence the upcoming election, Monday’s tour was the second time in two weeks that senior DHS officials have traveled to Arizona to tout Trump’s achievements on immigration and the border.

The acting Homeland Security secretary delivered similar remarks Oct. 22 from Phoenix during a meeting with local law enforcement groups in the state. He did not travel to the border on that occasion.

Trump himself has visited the state seven times this year, underscoring Arizona’s significance as a battleground state in the election. Two of those visits in June and August were to the Arizona-Mexico border in Yuma.

Monday’s visit was also Morgan’s second to Tucson in the past month. He traveled here Oct. 14 for a news conference on CBP’s enforcement statistics for Fiscal Year 2019.

Have any news tips or story ideas about the U.S.-Mexico border? Reach the reporter at rafael.carranza@arizonarepublic.com, or follow him on Twitter at @RafaelCarranza.

Support local journalism. Subscribe to azcentral.com today.

Source: https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/border-issues/2020/11/02/top-homeland-security-officials-swing-arizona-before-election/6131914002/

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The post CBP releases drone footage showing ‘new wall system’ being built first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Acting homeland security secretary Kevin McAleenan. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection/James Tourtellotte)

(The Washington Post) – Acting customs and border protection commissioner Mark Morgan said Sunday that the mass immigration raids at Mississippi workplaces last week were not “raids,” disputing the terminology that has been widely used to describe the operation.

“I think words matter. These aren’t raids. These are targeted law enforcement operations,” Morgan said on CNN.

Acting homeland security secretary Kevin McAleenan, meanwhile, said he regretted the timing of the raids, which were carried out just days after a mass shooting in which a gunman killed 22 people at an El Paso Walmart. The suspect told authorities that he was targeting “Mexicans,” according to police.”The timing was unfortunate,” McAleenan said on NBC News’ “Meet the Press”

U.S. authorities have in recent days strongly defended the raids amid outrage over images of weeping children arriving home to find their parents missing. The operation has also exposed what state and local officials say is a major shortcoming in ICE procedures for dealing with children, with parents caught up in immigration-related enforcement activities while at work unable to pick their children up from school, day-care centers and elsewhere, leaving some of them deserted and scared.

“In this case, this was a joint criminal investigation with ICE and the Department of Justice targeting worksite enforcement, meaning companies that knowingly and willfully hire illegal aliens so that, in most cases, they can pay them reduced wages, exploit them further for their bottom line,” Morgan said Sunday. “That’s what this investigation was about – a criminal investigation.”

Prosecuting corporations – as opposed to workers – for immigration-related offenses has slowed under the Trump administration, according to a database maintained by Duke University and the University of Virginia and data reviewed by The Washington Post, with only a handful of companies prosecuted for such violations since 2017.

Both Morgan and McAleenan suggested Sunday that videos of children crying after their parents were taken away were designed to elicit sympathy from the public.

“I know it’s emotional. I know it’s done on purpose to show a picture like that,” Morgan said about a widely circulated video of a young girl crying and begging for her father to be brought back.

Morgan added that he “understands” why the girl is upset, “but her father committed a crime.” He said the girl was later reunited with her mother.

McAleenan told NBC’s Chuck Todd that federal agents took the issue of the children’s welfare “very seriously.”

“I think it’s important, Chuck – you had a lot of really sympathetic video there, and I want to tell you that ICE took great pains to make sure that there were no child dependent-care issues that were ignored. … They had a process with 14 different caseworkers and phones available to call and find parents and kids and make arrangements, so this was done with sensitivity,” he said.

McAleenan also suggested that the raids were carried out to serve as a deterrent to other potential migrants from Latin America.

“The priority, right now, is our border security crisis, the humanitarian and security crisis at the border,” he said.

Todd interjected, pointing out that Mississippi is not on the border. McAleenan responded that the move was part of a “balanced enforcement strategy.”

“We’ve got to secure the border,” he said. “But we also have to have interior enforcement to stop this incentive, this work opportunity, that we have in the U.S. that employers are exploiting.”

On CNN, Morgan also took issue with the phrase “undocumented immigrants” to describe those targeted by the raids.

“These aren’t undocumented immigrants. These are illegal immigrants,” he said.

He parried questions about reports that President Donald Trump’s companies rely on undocumented immigrants. The Washington Post reported Friday that a Trump-owned construction company has employed undocumented immigrants for years, raising questions about how fully the Trump Organization has followed through on its pledge to more carefully scrutinize the legal status of its workers.

Asked why the federal government is turning a blind eye to the reports about President Trump’s companies, Morgan said he was offended by the question.

“What I can tell you is, in my 25 years, I take offense to saying anyone’s turning a blind eye to someone who’s violating the law,” he said.

Morgan also disputed the notion that there has never been a raid or investigation into Trump’s companies.

“You really can’t say that for sure, because there are investigations going on all the time … and we shouldn’t be aware of those investigations” because it could jeopardize them, he said.

Source: https://hamodia.com/2019/08/11/acting-border-patrol-chief-mississippi-ice-raids-arent-raids/

The post Acting Border Patrol Chief on Mississippi ICE Raids: ‘These Aren’t Raids’ first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Recently named the new head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, also known as ICE, Morgan offered a blunt assessment of what he thinks is needed to fix the nation’s southern border.

“The wall is part of the multi-layer strategy of infrastructure, personnel, and technology. Wherever that has been instituted along the southwest border, illegal immigration has gone down 90% and crime has gone down 85 to 95% in those areas. That’s not hyperbole. That’s not manufactured. That’s a fact.”

In Morgan’s view, the country is facing the worst crisis on the southern border in modern times. Among his concerns: the cost of taking agents off border security to process people.

Courtesy: Sinclair Broadcast Group

“The border is even more wide open than it’s ever been. The amount of bad people and drugs coming through in between the ports of entry.. We have no idea what’s getting through. But we know a lot is.”

We just visited one of eight checkpoints encircling the border city of El Paso. Like all the others, it was closed and had been for more than a month. Morgan said no one benefits more from this than the Mexican cartels who control the flow of drugs and people.

Courtesy: Sinclair Broadcast Group

“33% of young girls and women are physically assaulted or raped on the trek up here. It’s horrible. All they see is green, that’s it.”

This kind of talk may not be welcomed by his critics who already hear echoes of President Trump’s hardline policies, but Morgan says he’s not backing down.

Courtesy: Sinclair Broadcast Group

“This is about the rule of law. I know what’s true and I know what’s false. And here’s what I would tell the American people. By not fixing our laws we are actually complicit in these individuals making this dangerous trek. Risking their lives, risking their children’s lives. And they are dying and they are suffering and they are being sexually exploited. We are actually complicit in that because we’re not fixing this.”

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Source: https://wjla.com/news/lara-logan-investigates/the-new-head-of-ice-says-us-facing-worst-crisis-on-the-southern-border-in-modern-times

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The post The new head of ICE says US facing worst crisis on the southern border in ‘modern times’ first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.