WASHINGTON – The flow began with a comparative trickle, so no one in government took much notice.
In October 2011, U.S. border guards along the Rio Grand Valley frontier separating Texas and Mexico arrested about 1,800 unaccompanied children trying to sneak across the river.
Gradually, the numbers increased. By March of 2012 they had climbed to 2,760. A year and a half later in November 2013 the numbers reached 4,362. Then they suddenly skyrocketed.
Last month alone border guards arrested 10,664. Homeland Security alerted the White House and U.S. President Barack Obama suddenly had an immigration crisis on his hands.
Not that he hasn’t had one all along. With more than 11 million illegal immigrants in the U.S., Obama has debated with lawmakers for years about some level of amnesty, but to no avail.
Many conservative Republicans want all undocumented immigrants sent home. They argue that by granting them citizenship the government encourages more illegal entries and rewards criminal activity. Democrats and a small number of Republicans argue that many have built families in the U.S. and deporting them would be inhumane.
According to the Department of Homeland Security, more than 52,000 unaccompanied children have been apprehended in the last nine months. While the flow has slowed, the illegal entries continue.
The children’s crusade that begins in the ganglands of Honduras, Guatemala and San Salvador has created a whole new set of legal and political challenges.
A United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees report says the vast majority of children are asylum seekers fleeing criminal gangs. “The large majority of children interviewed … provided information that clearly indicates they may well be in need of international protection,” the report states.
A 2008 law requires the U.S. to grant child immigrants from Central America an immigration court hearing, which can take years. The system, however, is choked by a backlog of cases. A Syracuse University study shows that as of June 30 there were 41,641 juvenile cases and 333,862 other cases waiting to be heard.
The lack of resources can have serious consequences for the children. An analysis of closed and pending cases shows that less than half of the children have legal representation. It also shows that those children with legal counsel are four times more likely to be allowed to remain in the U.S. than those without.
To clear the backlog and fast track the process for recent arrivals, Obama has proposed congress approves $3.7 billion US. The money would also be used to house the children in secure buildings throughout the U.S. and hire more immigration judges – the current roster is about 220 — and lawyers.
Yet immigration judges say the added staff would not solve the problem, because judges have to be trained in the complexities of immigration law.
“The stakes for these kids can be life threatening. We often say we’re doing death penalty cases if a person is fleeing persecution,” Immigration Judge Dana Marks, president of the National Association of Immigration Judges, told the Dallas Observer. “If a judge makes a quick call and sends them back to their home country, they risk the fate of sending them back to possible death. And that’s why it seems unrealistic that this bill would be workable.”
Two Texas lawmakers – Republican Sen. John Cornyn and Democratic Congressman Henry Cuellar – support Obama. But conservative firebrand Sen. Ted Cruz opposes the Obama measure unless he reverses a 2012 directive that stopped the deportation of undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. when they were children. Cruz wants these millions of people deported immediately.
It’s unlikely Obama would ever agree to cancel his deferral directive. In 2012, Obama won 71 per cent of the Latino vote and the Democrats need their vote if they wish to retain the Senate in November’s mid-term elections.
There are faint signs of a bipartisan agreement, but most Republicans appear to favour simply sending the children home. Some have tried to seed fear among Americans by claiming the children are gangsters and drug dealers and carry dangerous diseases.
“Listen, if you’re 14, 15, 16, 17 years old, and you’re coming from a country that’s gang-infested … when you have those types coming across the border, they’re not children at that point,” Florida Republican Congressman Rich Nugent said on a radio show. “These kids have been brought up in a culture of thievery. A culture of murder, of rape. And now we are going to infuse them into the American culture. It’s just ludicrous.”
Georgia Republican Congressman Phil Gingrey claimed there are reports the children are “carrying swine flu, dengue fever, Ebola virus and tuberculosis.” (The Centers for Disease Control has confirmed that there is no Ebola virus in the Americas.)
Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul suggested the U.S. should skip the warehousing and the judicial process. “I have compassion for them,” he told fellow Republicans in Maryland. “You should be flying them back home in a nice way.”
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