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The surge in illegal immigration across the southern U.S. border is shaping up to be the biggest in 20 years. Unlike migrant surges in 2019 and 2014, which were predominantly made up of Central American families and unaccompanied children, so far this one is being driven by individual adults.

Most of the migrants are Mexicans, often men in search of work with the pandemic easing and the U.S. economy set to boom. Apprehensions at the southern border totaled 382,000 from the beginning of the fiscal year in October through February, up 42% compared to the same period of 2019a year that saw the highest number of apprehensions since 2007. In 2020, the influx of migrants plummeted due to the pandemic.

Single adults account for 82% of the apprehensions so far this fiscal year, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. Some 60% of all single adults apprehended were Mexicans. Border patrol agents say the majority of single adults they catch are men, entering to look for work such as picking fruits and vegetables, roofing and dishwashing.

The influx of children arriving alone at the border has captured broad attention. While apprehensions of mostly Central American families and unaccompanied minors have grown in the past few months, their numbers overall are still much smaller than those of adults.

The number of families caught trying to cross the border rose to 39,000 during the first five months of this fiscal year, from just over 37,000 during the same period in 2020. During the same period in 2019, more than 136,000 families were arrested at the border.

Read more here:
Men Looking for Work Drive Surge in Illegal Crossings at the U.S. Border - The Wall Street Journal

Joe Biden faced difficult questions about the largest surge of migrants at the Mexican border in two decades at his first press conference as US president as well as talking tough on China and pledging to give out 200 million Covid-19 vaccine doses in the next 100 days.

When asked about the growingsurge of migrants, Biden said that the way to deal with this problem is to deal with the root causes of why people are leaving as well as emphasising that the US is sending back the vast majority of people coming across the Mexican border.

Biden said that all illegal immigrants should be going back except for children, and that his administration is in negotiations with Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to encourage the USs southern neighbour to take more people back.

Spikes in illegal immigration through the Mexican border happen every single year, Biden said.

The president was on the back foot in response to questions on the border, FRANCE 24 International Affairs Editor Armen Georgian said. He did something Trump used to do a lot, which is to say that it was essentially the guy who was in office before me and thats why were in a mess now but even the [Democrat-supporting] Washington Post has reported that this is the biggest surge in 20 years and this is happening on Bidens watch.

The fact is that Biden said at a Democratic primary debate in September 2019 that if you want to flee and if youre fleeing oppression, you should come, Georgian continued. Now, faced with a huge immigration surge, Biden has completely back-pedalled and said: actually, dont come.

Ahead of the conference, a pair of mass shootings, rising international tensions, signs of divisions within the Democratic Party, new North Korean missile tests and a large increase in numbers of migrants crossing the USA's southern border were all confronting a West Wing known for its tight message discipline.

Covid-19 jab pledge

Bidenalso announced at the conference a pledge to administer 200 million coronavirus vaccine doses within 100 days. This objectiveseems ambitious, but it actually amounts to a continuation of the country's existing pace of vaccinations through the end of month. TheUSis now averaging about 2.5 million doses per day.

A higher vaccination rate seems achievable. Over the next month, two of the bottlenecks to getting Americans vaccinated are set to be lifted. The US supply of vaccines is on track to increase and states are lifting eligibility requirements for people to get the shots.

The fundamental problem is giving people piece of mind amid a Covid-19 pandemic that has caused more than 500,000 deaths, Biden said.

When asked about the intense polarisation in US politics with Bidens $1.9 trillion Covid-19 stimulus bill passing the Senate on party lines he said: I would like elected Republican support but what I have now is support from Republican voters.

Biden 'on the backfoot' over immigration surge

His Covid-19 relief bill wassimilarin size to Trumps proposal, which was ditched towards the end of his presidency amid lawmakers opposition.

Filibuster gridlock

As debate rages over the Senate filibuster a major source of the USs political gridlock Biden said that it is being abused and reiterated his call for bringing back the so-called talking filibuster, in which Senators have to stand and talk for as long as it takes to block a bill instead of being able to do so with the mere threat of the filibuster.

When a journalist asked Biden if he agreed with his former boss Barack Obama that the filibuster is a relic of the Jim Crow era, the president said he agreed. But he reiterated his support for reforming, not abolishing, the filibuster, saying that successful electoral politics is the art of the possible.

Biden said he has never been particularly poor in getting things done in the US Senate after serving in the upper chamber from 1973 to 2009 and that if there is complete lockdown and chaos in the Senate as a result of the filibuster, well have to go beyond what I talked about.

From Afghanistan to Xi Jinping

On foreign affairs, Biden said his May 1 deadline to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan would be hard to meet amid the Talibans resurgence but underlined that it is not my intention to stay there for a long time. He said he cant picture it being the case that US soldiers will still be there next year.

In response to North Koreas new ballistic missile tests on Thursday, Biden warned that there will be responses if they choose to escalate while adding that he is also prepared for some diplomacy although it has to be conditioned on moves towards denuclearisation.

Biden said he was going to invest in the American people and American science to counter Chinas challenge to US hegemony. China is out-investing us by a long shot, he warned.

Re-establishing our alliances after Trumps America First approach is another means by which Biden says he hopes to deal with the authoritarian Chinas rise. We have to have democracies working together, he continued.

Biden said he pointed out to [Chinese leader Xi Jinping] that no leader can remain in office unless they reflect the values of their people and that the moment a US president walks away from speaking out about abuses like Chinas repression of Uighurs and Hong Kong, we lose our legitimacy.

The president said he knew Xi well from his role as Obamas number 2. He doesn't have a democratic with a small 'd' bone in his body, but he's a smart, smart guy, Biden said.

He'll be back?

Biden is the first president in four decades to reach this point in his term without having conducted such a question-and-answer session. The president met with reporters for the nationally televised afternoon event in the East Room.

The US presidenthas been on pace with his predecessors in taking questions from the press in other formats. But he tended to field just one or two informal inquiries at a time, usually in a hurried setting at the end of an event or in front of a whirring helicopter.

Pressure had mounted on Biden to hold such a formal session, which allows reporters to have an extended back-and-forth with the president. Critics have pointed to the delay to suggest that the 78-year-old president's staff were shielding him.

Despite his advanced age, Biden said at the press conference that his plan is to run for re-election in 2024.

(FRANCE 24 with AP and REUTERS)

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Joe Biden on the back foot over immigration surge in first press conference - FRANCE 24 English

Sharlee Mullins Glenn and Jennifer Fuentes Langi, Opinion contributors Published 3:15 a.m. ET March 26, 2021

Cruelly separating families for such long periods of time serves no one. It has also turned out to be an incentive for people to remain here illegally.

Silvia Avelar Floresis a soft-spoken, devoted mother of three young children. She came to the United Statesfrom Mexico with her family when she was just 7 years old, and has lived here ever since. She graduated from school here, married, had children, works, pays taxes, has no criminal record of any kind, and is a highly respected member of her community. Her husband Carlos, a long-time legal resident, recently became a U.S. citizen. As soon as he could, he filed an I-130 immigrant petition formfor Silvia the important first step in obtaining a green card allowing her to live and work in America. Happily, the I-130 was approved.

There is now a pathway to citizenship for Silvia, but she is unable to move forward. Why? Because of a counterproductive provision that was put in place in 1996 by the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act. This provision established the so-called bars to reentry for immigrants who leave the country for any reason after having lived here unlawfully. If such an immigrant has been in the United Statesfor more than 180 days but less than a year, they are barred from reentering the country for three years. If for more than a year, they are barred from reentry for 10 years.

These bars create a nightmarish catch-22 for people like Silvia because current law requires that they must return to their country of origin to apply for a green card, but as soon as they leave, they are immediately barred from returning.

In Silvias case, because her husband is a citizen, she qualifies for a waiver which would allow her to return sooner, but she would still be separated from her family (her husband and her three U.S. citizen children, ages 6, 12and 14) for a minimum of two to three years. Without the waiver, it would be a full 10years.

Many of the issues around immigration are complex and messy. There are no easy answers to the knotty questions surrounding border security, enforcement, immigration court backlogs, guest worker programs, trafficking, and so on. By all accounts, our immigration system is broken and needs a complete overhaul. Comprehensive immigration reform so necessary, but so difficult to achieve will take time, effort and compromise.

Silvia Avelar Flores with her husband, Carlos, and three children in Salt Lake City in 2019.(Photo: Terra Cooper)

But eliminating these inhumane bars to reentry is a simple fix that Congress could tackle right now. And its a move that already has bipartisan support. Former Republican Rep. Raul Labrador of Idaho, who worked for 15 years as an immigration attorney, said of the bars: If we get rid of what we call the bars . . . we could fix the problem for about 25 percent of the people that are here illegally. And we would do it through the proper legal system.

Business leaders: Give immigrant 'Dreamers' the legal status and certainty they deserve

This one simple fix would have an enormous positive impact on millions of American families. The Migration Policy Institute estimates that more than 1.2 million spouses of U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents are blocked from becoming legal residents themselves because of these bars. Eliminating them would not create any new pathways to citizenship. It would merely eliminate the barriers to pathways that already exist. And itwould allow those who already qualify for green cards to move forward without having to make the excruciating decision to be separated from their families for many years a decision that can have terribly damaging repercussions on children, spousesand other family members.

Cruelly separating families for such long periods of time serves no one. There are no benefits,only costs including to society. In many cases, families that have been stable and self-sufficient suddenly find themselves dependent on government assistance for childcare, health care, and other basic necessities when a parent is barred from reentry.

Not only are these bars inhumane, they are also ineffective and even counterproductive. The bars were intended to be a deterrent, but in fact have turned out to be an incentive for people to remain in the country illegally so that they are not barred from being with their families. Far from curtailing illegal immigration and deterring people from overstaying their visas as intended," Paul Virtue, former general counsel of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, has told Congress, the legal bars to admissibility "are actuallycontributing to the unprecedented risein the number of undocumented immigrants.

Silvia and her family have lived in a state of uncertainty and fear for many years now as theyve done everything they possibly can to get legal. Until she has a green card, her situation is precarious and she could be deported at any time. The toll on Silvia and her family, financially (due to the never-ending legal fees), mentally, and especially emotionally, has been immense. Her young children have spent their entire lives fearful that their beloved mother might be snatched away from them at any time.

Colombian President Duque: 'We're not a rich nation, but we tried to do something humanitarian' for migrants

These inhumane 3- and 10-year bars to reentry create insurmountable obstacles for people who, like Silvia, are trying as hard as they can to get in line (as they are so often told to do) so that they can follow the outlinedprocedure to become legal residents.

Immigration reform is inherently nuanced and complicated, and policymakers must often weigh many different competing factors. But in the case of these bars, its a no brainer. They are both cruel and ineffective. They harm American families and have actually led to an increase in the number of undocumented immigrants in the United States.

Sharlee Mullins Glenn, founder of the nonprofitMormon Women for Ethical Government and a longtime advocate working with Silvia,isan executive officer of the Everyone Belongs Project and sits on the external advisory board of Brigham Young University's Civic Engagement program.Jennifer Fuentes Langi, Silvia's attorney, is afounding partner and lead immigration attorney at Fuentes Langi Immigration in Salt Lake City. She was born and raised in Mexico.

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Congress could help this young mom and other families trapped in an immigration Catch-22 - USA TODAY

Illegal alien and undocumented immigrant are descriptions muttered by politicians in the news and maybe sometimes even among our family and friends.

The Biden administration as part of its proposed overhaul of the immigration system is pushing for dropping the term illegal alien for language that is more inclusive.

We have only been in office for 50 days, but again were building a government thats inclusive, were building a government that truly reflects America and a big part of that is ensuring that were using the correct terminology and words, stated White House Senior Director of Coalition Media, Jennifer Molina.

Hearing the words inclusion and immigration reform may conjure up many feelings in many people. It puts people in camps about issues. You may see these words as necessary, you may see them as buzzwords.

So, do words really matter?

Words matter because words have power, they reflect whats happening and help construct whats happening. They shape our thinking, and they shape our reality, said ASU professor Eileen Diaz-McConnell.

How we talk about immigration impacts how we think about immigrants.

The battle to stop using words such as illegal alien began in 2010 with the Drop the I-word" campaign which was led by the organization Race Forward.

Many news outlets stopped using it in 2013, but the term is still used today to describe undocumented immigrants whether it is in some news outlets or in social media by federal agencies such as U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

CBPAZ

Professor Diaz-McConnel says the term criminalizes people. She says its been racialized since its not used to describe all undocumented immigrants.

Its associated to particular groups such as Mexican migrants and potentially all Mexican migrants, but its not to other people such as Irish migrants who overstayed their visas to a variety of other people.

Being called the I-word damages people of color regardless of their immigration status.

It upsets me, it burns right in my chest because were not aliens, said Lucinda Hinojos.

Hinojos was raised and born in Arizona, she identifies herself as Chicana and Native American. She recently painted a mural of an indigenous and Chicana woman on 14th Street and McDowell Road to bring awareness about the dehumanization of people of color.

She says an indigenous and Chicana woman on a mural is the reflection of why representation and dropping words like illegal alien matter.

We need to throw that out of the vocabulary because were all human beings. Were all different, but were one spirit being and so these words carry power.

So, if words carry power, what happens when we use hateful words?

If you do a quick Google or YouTube search and use search words street vending you will see a lot of examples where ordinary citizens are harassing, violently attacking our street vendors, said Emir Estrada, Assistant professor at ASU.

Estrada says theres been a spike in violent attacks against communities of color such as street vendors. She says the attacker usually believes street vending is illegal because they associate the individual with illegality and as an illegal immigrant.

They're told wetbacks, go back to your country, says Estrada.

Professor Diaz-McConnell says theres a long history of xenophobic language about immigrants.

This exclusion of immigrants has been reflected in U.S. immigration policy since the very beginning. For example, in 1790, one of the requirements to become naturalized was being a free white person and it wasnt removed until many decades later.

But history can be wrong sometimes, in this case, the act of being in the U.S. without documents is in fact illegal, but the person is not.

Estrada says being undocumented is usually a civil offense rather than a criminal.

Many of them had visas, came with a visa to visit a family member and for various circumstances overstayed their visas so again these labels are not being properly attached to these communities that were talking about."

Just like undocumented immigrants who were brought to the country as children.

Its not like I'm asking you to call me by a different name, like call me God or your majesty, Im just asking you to call me a human being, said Jose Patio, a DREAMer in Phoenix.

So how do we fix this?

I think it is really important to broaden our perspective and think about the things that unite us and try to be more thoughtful about the way we talk about or think about other groups of people, stated Diaz-McConnell.

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Words Matter: A conversation with the community about words that dehumanize people - ABC15 Arizona

Mr Speaker, I wish to make a statement on our New Plan for Immigration.

The government has taken back control of legal immigration by ending free movement and introducing a points-based immigration system.

We are now addressing the challenge of illegal immigration - head on.

I am introducing the most significant overhaul of our asylum system in decades.

A new, comprehensive, fair but firm, long-term plan.

Because while people are dying, we have a responsibility to act.

People are dying - at sea, in lorries and in shipping containers - having put their lives in the hands of criminal gangs that facilitate illegal journeys to the UK.

To stop the deaths, we must stop the trade in people that cause them.

Our society is enriched by legal immigration.

We celebrate those who have come to the UK lawfully and helped build Britain. We always will.

Since 2015, we have resettled almost 25,000 men, women and children seeking refuge from persecution across the world - more than any EU country.

Welcomed more than 29,000 close relatives through refugee family reunion.

And created a pathway to citizenship to enable over five million people in Hong Kong to come to the UK.

Nobody can say that the British public are not fair or generous when it comes to helping those in need.

But the British public also recognise that for too long parts of the immigration system have been open to abuse.

At the heart of our New Plan for Immigration is a simple principle: fairness.

Access to the UKs asylum system should be based on need, not the ability to pay people smugglers.

If you enter illegally from a safe country like France where you should and could have claimed asylum, you are not seeking refuge from persecution as is the intended purpose of the asylum system.

Instead, you are choosing the UK as your preferred destination.

And you are doing so at the expense of those with nowhere else to go.

Our system is collapsing under the pressure of parallel illegal routes to asylum, facilitated by criminal smugglers.

The existence of parallel routes is deeply unfair, advancing those with the means to pay smugglers over those in desperate need.

The capacity of our asylum system is not unlimited.

And so the presence of economic migrants which these illegal routes introduce, limits our ability to properly support others in genuine need of protection.

This is manifestly unfair to those desperately waiting to be resettled in the UK.

And it is not fair to the British people either; whose taxes pay for vital public services and an asylum system which has skyrocketed in cost now costing over 1 billion pounds this year.

There were more than 32,000 attempts tried to enter the UK illegally in 2019.

With 8,500 people arriving by small boat in 2020.

Of those, 87% were men, 74% were aged between 18-39.

We should ask ourselves, where are the vulnerable women and children that this system should exist to protect?

The system is becoming overwhelmed 109,000 claims are sitting in the asylum queue 52,000 awaiting an initial asylum decision. Almost three quarters of those waiting a year or more.

42,000 failed asylum seekers have not left the country, despite having their claim refused.

The persistent failure to enforce our immigration laws, with a system that is open to gaming by economic migrants and exploitation by criminals, is eroding public trust, and disadvantaging vulnerable people who need our help.

Which is why our New Plan for Immigration is driven by three fair but firm objectives:

First. To increase the fairness of our system so we can protect and support those in genuine need of asylum.

Second. To deter illegal entry into the UK breaking the business model of people smugglers and protecting the lives of those they endanger.

Third. To remove more easily from the UK, those with no right to be here.

Let me take each in turn, Mr Speaker.

First. We will continue to provide safe refuge to those in need strengthening support for those arriving through safe and legal routes.

People coming to the UK through resettlement routes will be granted indefinite leave to remain.

They will receive more support to learn English, find work and integrate.

And I will also act to help those who have suffered injustices.

By amending British Nationality Law so that members of the Windrush Generation will be able to obtain British citizenship more easily.

Second. This plan marks a step change in our approach as we toughen our stance to deter illegal entry and the criminals that endanger life by enabling it.

Many illegal arrivals have travelled through a safe country like France to get to the UK where they could and should have claimed asylum.

We must act to reduce the pull factors of our system and disincentivise illegal entry.

For the first time, whether people enter the UK legally or illegally will have an impact on how their asylum claim progresses, and on their status in the UK if that claim is successful.

We will deem their claim as inadmissible, and make every effort to remove those who enter the UK illegally having travelled through a safe country first in which they could and should have claimed asylum.

Only where removal is not possible, will those who have successful claims having entered illegally receive a new temporary protection status.

This is not an automatic right to settle, they will be regularly reassessed for removal, and will include limited access to benefits, and limited family reunion rights. Our tough new stance will also include:

New maximum life sentences for people smugglers and facilitators.

New rules to stop unscrupulous people posing as children.

And strengthen enforcement powers for Border Force.

Third. We will seek to rapidly remove those with no right to be here in the UK.

Establishing a fast-track appeals process.

Streamlining the appeals system and making quicker removal decisions for failed asylum seekers and dangerous foreign criminals.

We will tackle the practice of meritless claims which clog up the courts with last minute claims and appeals.

A fundamental unfairness that lawyers tell me frustrates them too.

Because for too long our justice system has been gamed.

Almost three quarters of migrants in detention raised last-minute new claims, challenges or other issues with over eight in ten of these eventually being denied as valid reasons to stay in the UK.

Enough is enough.

Our new plan sets out a one-stop process to require all claims to be made upfront.

No more endless meritless claims to frustrate removal. No more stalling justice.

Our new system will be faster and fairer and will help us better support the most vulnerable.

Mr Speaker, our new plan builds on the work already done to take back control of our borders.

Building a system that upholds our reputation as a country where criminality is not rewarded, but which is a haven for those in need.

There are no quick fixes, or shortcuts to success.

But this long-term plan, pursued doggedly, will fix our broken system.

We know that members of the Opposition would prefer a different plan, one that embraces the idea of Open Borders.

Many of them were reluctant to end Free Movement.

With members opposite on record as having said that all immigration controls are racist or sexist.

And to those who say we lack compassion, I simply say, while people are dying we must act to deter these journeys.

And if you dont like our plan, where is yours?

This government promised to take a common-sense approach to controlling immigration legal and illegal and we will deliver on that promise.

The UK is playing its part to tackle the inhumanity of illegal migration, and today I will press for global action at the G6.

I commend this statement to the House

More:
Home Secretary's statement on the New Plan for Immigration - GOV.UK