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The White House reiterated, a few hours before the end of title 42, that it is ready to face the increase in migrants at the border and that, from May 12, it will be more difficult to enter the country illegally and there will be more serious consequences.
The US Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, was blunt: the border is closed. And he blamed Congress for the current situation: “Our current situation is the result of Congress leaving an outdated and broken immigration system for more than two decades, despite unanimous agreement that we desperately need law reform. It is also the result of Congress’s decision not to provide us with the resources that we need and that we requested.”
Mayorkas said that to face this immigration crisis, the United States has more than 20,000 agents to patrol the border and new resources and personnel to process migrants and quickly expel those who are not admitted to Mexico and other countries. At the same time, more avenues for legal migration will be available, already applying in centers in Latin America, and an aggressive campaign against traffickers, who say the border is now open.
On the same day that Title 42 ends, the Republican-majority House of Representatives, this Thursday, approved a bill that aims to restrict asylum, extend the border wall and eliminate a program that allows migrants the opportunity to stay in the US, including Ukrainian refugees.
Clay Higgins, a Republican lawmaker from Louisiana, said: “We are responding to the complete collapse of our sovereignty on the southern border, brought about in the United States by my colleagues on the other side of the House.”
President Joe Biden has already said that he will veto this Republican bill. An initiative that will fail before the Democratic majority in the Senate, but could be the starting point for a new immigration debate in Congress.
