The Washington Post - 01.08.2019

THURSDAY, AUGUST 1 , 2019. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A

forcement efforts, while the num-

ber of border arrests remains at

levels two to three times higher

than during previous years for the

month of July.

But putting pressure on Mexi-

co, Guatemala and other nations

in the region appears to be the

Trump administration’s quickest

path to tighter enforcement.

James Nealon, the former U.S.

ambassador to Honduras who left

his job as the top policy official at

Homeland Security last year out

of frustration with the adminis-

tration’s immigration agenda,

said the new, more international

focus of the effort was a reflection

of McAleenan’s belief that messag-

ing and perception are crucial to

deterring migration.

“I think what we were seeing up

until a couple months ago was

Trump — through his ventrilo-

quist Stephen Miller — doing ev-

erything possible to limit the

number of foreigners who come

into the country and limit the

number of foreigners already liv-

ing in the country,” said Nealon,

referring to the president’s senior

policy adviser.

“Now what you’re seeing is

McAleenan, who has a more nu-

anced understanding of push fac-

tors and probably understands

the border better than anyone in

the government,” Nealon said.

“He’s trying to do things down-

range to limit the number of peo-

ple who try to come to the border

in the first place.”

Sen. Johnson sent a letter in

July to top administration offi-

cials pitching what he called “Op-

eration Safe Return” to surge

judges, asylum officers and attor-

neys to the border and fast-track

asylum cases, swiftly deporting

applicants who don’t qualify in-

stead of allowing them to be re-

leased.

Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.),

Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) and

Doug Jones (D-Ala.) signed on, but

the proposal faces dim prospects

with many other Democrats out-

raged by the treatment of mi-

grants in U.S. custody and the

president’s statements.

“The president’s rhetoric

shouldn’t affect Democrats’ will-

ingness to look at a problem and

solve it,” said Johnson, who then

conceded the plan wasn’t likely to

become law any time soon.

[email protected]

bilateral negotiations play to his

strengths, and that allows him to

take a more hard-line position.”

With Mexico and then Guate-

mala, the president went straight

for the kneecaps, threatening

Mexico’s export-dependent econ-

omy with escalating tariffs and

telling Guatemalans he’d revoke

their visas and tax cash remittanc-

es sent by relatives working in the

United States.

Both times, Trump got what he

wanted, but the deals have left the

United States more reliant on for-

eign governments to deliver U.S.

enforcement goals.

The Guatemala accord appears

especially fragile, and its opera-

tional details have yet to be

mapped out. Protests flared this

week in Guatemala City, where

President Jimmy Morales was

mocked as a U.S. lackey, and Gua-

temala’s highest court has ruled

that the deal will require the ap-

proval of lawmakers. The country

has a presidential election in two

weeks, and the acting secretary of

homeland security, Kevin Mc-

Aleenan, traveled to Guatemala

on Wednesday to promote the

deal and keep it from falling apart.

Homeland Security officials did

not respond to requests for addi-

tional details about the accord, its

cost, how it will be implemented,

and the number or nationality of

the asylum seekers the United

States plans to send to Guatemala.

The architecture of the admin-

istration’s enforcement system

also appears to be wobbling in

Mexico, where President Andrés

Manuel López Obrador reiterated

his opposition this week to a “safe

third country” accord like the one

Guatemala agreed to.

His administration pledged in

the June 7 deal with Trump to

begin working on a regionwide

overhaul of asylum rules, but in

comments this week Foreign Min-

ister Marcelo Ebrard signaled that

such measures would not be nec-

essary because Mexico’s crack-

down has reduced the flow of mi-

grants to the U.S. border by nearly

40 percent in less than two

months. Ebrard said U.S. authori-

ties had made about 87,000 ar-

rests in July, down from more than

104,000 in June.

Homeland Security officials de-

clined to confirm those statistics,

but if accurate, they indicate di-

minishing returns for Mexico’s en-

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-

Mass.) says the nation cannot ig-

nore established law — she said

“laws matter” — noting that seek-

ing asylum is not a crime.

“And as Americans, what we

need to do is have a sane system

that keeps us safe at the border,

but does not criminalize the activ-

ity... of a mother fleeing here for

safety,” she said.

As the immigration debate

hardens ahead of the 2020 cam-

paign, with Democrats denounc-

ing the president’s border policies,

the chances of a long-elusive com-

promise deal appear even more

remote. That has left Trump offi-

cials increasingly outsourcing

their most dramatic immigration

enforcement efforts to other gov-

ernments — and threatening to

punish them if they don’t go along.

After more than 144,000 mi-

grants were taken into custody

along the southern border in May

— the highest monthly total since

2007 — the president strong-

armed Mexican authorities to de-

ploy thousands of national guard

troops to carry out immigration

enforcement within their borders.

Cris Ramón, an immigration

analyst at the Bipartisan Policy

Center, said the episode reflected

the president’s favored approach

to dealmaking. “Trump likes one-

on-one negotiations, that’s his

forte,” he said. “With the Demo-

crats, there are many points of

entry, so there is less of a way to

put pressure on individuals. But

been holding back from more-

aggressive enforcement mea-

sures, saying he has been waiting

for Democrats to act.

“Despite the Democrats want-

ing very unsafe Open Borders &

refusing to change the Loopholes

& Asylum, tremendous progress is

being made on the southern bor-

der,” the president tweeted Tues-

day. “We all waited because we

assumed the Dems would ulti-

mately be forced to change the

horrible Immigration Laws. They

didn’t!”

The large field of Democratic

presidential candidates generally

has jostled over proposals to break

with the party’s conventional

views on border security — includ-

ing the decriminalization of un-

lawful entry — while offering

those seeking refuge in the United

States a way to access the nation’s

long-standing asylum protec-

tions.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.)

said in Tuesday night’s presiden-

tial debate that there is a will to

change the rules in Congress, but

she said it would have to be in a

way that provides a pathway to

asylum for those who are perse-

cuted while also stemming the

flow of migrants to the border

itself: “I believe that immigrants

don’t diminish America; they are

America. And if you want to do

something about border security,

you first of all change the rules so

people can seek asylum in those

Northern Triangle countries.”

Wis.), chairman of the Homeland

Security and Governmental Af-

fairs Committee, said in an inter-

view. “The word is out that the

system is easy to exploit, and that’s

why the numbers have exploded.”

The administration’s initiatives

have triggered court challenges

and several injunctions blocking

them. But Trump officials bounce

back by debuting new measures to

diversify their enforcement ef-

forts and put up new bureaucratic

obstacles at the border even as

others are knocked down.

Last week in San Francisco, U.S.

District Judge Jon S. Tigar

blocked the administration’s at-

tempt to deny asylum to those

who fail to seek refuge in another

nation while transiting to the

United States. Tigar, appointed by

President Barack Obama, also

halted a previous administration

attempt to refuse asylum to those

who cross the border illegally. The

judge pointed to U.S. immigration

statutes that offer broad protec-

tions to vulnerable groups seeking

shelter from persecution, telling

the administration it lacks the

authority to override those laws

by decree.

But within days of Tigar’s rul-

ing, which the Justice Depart-

ment has appealed, the Trump

administration announced its

asylum deal with Guatemala. And

federal courts have allowed

Homeland Security officials to

continue the border-wide expan-

sion of the “Remain in Mexico”

program, or Migrant Protection

Protocols.

That program requires asylum

seekers to wait outside the United

States — mostly in high-crime

Mexican border cities — while

their legal claims wend through

U.S. immigration courts, a process

that typically takes several

months or longer. More than

20,000 asylum seekers have been

sent back to wait in Mexico since

January, according to the latest

figures from Mexican and U.S. of-

ficials.

Those measures, combined

with the Guatemala accord poten-

tially allowing U.S. border agents

to send asylum seekers there, give

the administration multiple chan-

nels to reroute asylum seekers out

of the country instead of releasing

them into the U.S. interior.

Trump this week appeared to

suggest his administration has

rolled out so hastily that U.S. law-
makers have yet to receive a copy.
Attorney General William P.
Barr then cinched the asylum sys-
tem tighter on Monday, issuing a
ruling that makes it more difficult
for applicants to seek protection
when their family members face
threats. Advocacy groups say the
change could lead thousands of
claimants to lose the ability to
seek refuge in the United States.
The moves, amid a flurry of
others in recent weeks, add to
what increasingly appears as a
complex, Rube Goldberg-esque
system of enforcement and deter-
rence. The U.S. government has
allowed itself to send Honduran
and Salvadoran asylum seekers to
Guatemala, to make Guatemalans
wait in Mexico and to deport thou-
sands of others who until recently
could have qualified for humani-
tarian protection.
Homeland Security officials
and the president’s defenders say
the multitrack measures are rea-
sonable stopgaps made necessary
by Democrats’ unwillingness to fix
festering, obvious flaws in the U.S.
immigration system that smug-
gling organizations exploit with
impunity. Knowing that families
have an easier path to release in
the United States, and that asylum
claimants have rights once they
touch U.S. soil, smuggling guides
have seized on the opportunity:
The number of migrants express-
ing a fear of persecution at the
border and applying for asylum
has soared in recent years, adding
to a crippling backlog of more
than 800,000 cases in U.S. immi-
gration courts.
Border arrests have fallen
about 40 percent since June 7,
when the Mexican government
agreed to start an unprecedented
crackdown to avoid Trump’s
threat of tariffs. But the number of
migrants taken into custody re-
mains at the highest level in more
than a decade, on pace to ap-
proach 1 million arrests during
the current fiscal year, driven by a
record influx of children and fami-
lies far more difficult to deport
than single adults.
“If we can pass laws to fix this,
that’d be the best thing, but
Trump is trying to do it without
the help of Democrats or the
courts,” Sen. Ron Johnson (R-

BORDER FROM A

Trump administration narrows access to asylum system

JABIN BOTSFORD/THE WASHINGTON POST

President Trump watches as acting homeland security secretary

Kevin McAleenan, right, and Guatemalan Interior Minister

Enrique Degenhart sign a deal to restrict U.S. asylum applications.

You know the feeling when you actually wake up

early to go to the gym?

Rolling over your old 401k can bring you that same sense of satisfaction —without the alarm clock. Our

team of rollover specialists will walk you through the process step by step, and even call your old provider.

We do the heavy lifting so you can focus on feeling accomplished.

Get up to $600 when you roll over your old 401k into an IRA.

A rollover is not your only alternative when dealing with old retirement plans. Please visit tdameritrade.com/rollover for more information on rollover alternatives. See tdameritrade.com/600offer for offer

details and restrictions/conditions. This is not an offer or solicitation in any jurisdiction where we are not authorized to do business. TD Ameritrade, Inc., member FINRA/SIPC. © 2019 TD Ameritrade.

Visit tdameritrade.com/rollover to get started today.