Any Central American who pays attention to US politics knows that migration is one of the main ties that unite that country with the region: at least some four million migrants from the region live in the United States, and many are paying close attention to what will happen in the presidential elections in November.
The two main candidates for the White House, the current Democratic vice president, Kamala Harris, and the former Republican president, Donald Trump, have made their positions clear on the issue. Harris promises to expand security on the border with Mexico, in addition to restarting the “strongest border bill in decades,” which failed in Congress. Trump, on the other hand, is more rigid, promising mass deportations.
Napoleon Campos, political scientist and expert in international relations told the Voice of America On the one hand, there is the issue of the border and its security, and on the other, the situation of the millions of Central Americans who are already in the United States and who are perceived to be “tired” because they have not managed to regularize their immigration status despite having lived in the North American country for years.
“Although the last president to carry out immigration reform was Republican Ronald Reagan, there have been major missed opportunities in both the Clinton and Obama administrations, although several important contingents were opened to regularize hundreds of thousands of our compatriots,” he said.
Campos refers to the two most important programs for migrants in the United States: Temporary Protection Status, known as TPS, which has provided a provisional solution to those who cannot return to their countries of origin due to various problems, and the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy, known as DACA or Dreamers.
Two visions on immigration
“As president, I will take back the bipartisan border security bill that he (Trump) killed, and sign it into law,” Harris said of border policy during her presidential nomination acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention held in Chicago from August 19 to 22.
This project involves hiring 1,500 Border Patrol agents to secure the border and prevent illegal migration and drug trafficking; and 4,300 asylum officers who would be responsible for processing applications from migrants seeking to enter the United States legally.
Although the bill was initially bipartisan, meaning it had the support of senators from both parties, it ultimately failed to move forward, and Harris blames Trump for that.
“Trump believes a border deal would hurt his campaign. So he ordered his allies in Congress to scrap the deal. I refuse to play politics with our security. (…) We can create an earned path to citizenship and secure our border,” Harris added.
Trump is far from his vision and blames him not only for the fact that during his administration some 20 million migrants entered through the southern border but also for seeking to grant citizenship to people of whom he “has no idea who they are.”
“She wants to end the detention of illegal alien immigrants who unleash vicious monsters on our communities to rape, maim and murder our people,” Trump said at a recent press conference. “She wants to give everyone citizenship and free government healthcare,” he added.
According to Campos, “the Republican proposal clearly states that they are going to carry out the largest deportation in the entire history of the United States to remove from the country the 8, 10, 12, 14 or 16 million undocumented or irregular migrants, as they are called in other analysis and immigration policy schemes.”
In Central America, only El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua have the benefit of TPS. For El Salvador, according to the most recent update, the program will be in effect until March 9, 2025; in Honduras and Nicaragua until July 5, 2025.
Meanwhile, DACA, a program that protects nearly half a million young people who entered the United States illegally as children, remains in limbo. This program was promoted by Barack Obama and must be renewed every two years.
DACA has faced ongoing challenges in U.S. courts, and in 2017 the administration of former President Trump announced it would dismantle it. This led to several lawsuits that put the program on hold, preventing more young people from taking advantage of it.
Then Joe Biden came to the Presidency and reactivated DACA, allowing new applicants to register for the first time. This is how around 100,000 young people registered, who are now in legal limbo because a court ruled against approving new applications as of July 16, 2021.
Those who are already covered by DACA are still protected, but are still waiting for a law that grants them permanent protection.
“DACA was always intended to be a temporary relief until Congress acted on a permanent solution. The time has passed for Congress to do its part and give a path to citizenship to those who have dreamers”, said Democratic Senator Dick Durbin, a position shared by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham who believes that the priority is to resolve the problem at the border.
Also read: US Senate discusses future of DACA: economic contribution vs. national security.
The United States remains the destination for one in five migrants worldwide, according to the Inter-American Dialogue organization.
“Migration to the United States continues at record levels and will continue to have a positive impact on the volumes of remittances sent back to the region. More than 80 percent of remittances sent to the region originate in the United States, while 17 percent come from Europe and the rest of the world, and three percent are intraregional remittances,” explains Manuel Orozco, of the Inter-American Dialogue, in a statement. report recent.
El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua received approximately $40 billion in remittances in 2023, according to calculations by the VOA based on reports from the central banks of each country.
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