Thursday, March 28

With or without Title 42, migrants will continue to risk everything

Familias migrantes que cruzaron el Río Grande hacia EE.UU. el 5 de mayo de 2022 llegan a Roma, Texas.
Migrant families who crossed the Rio Grande into the US on May 5, 2022 arrive in Rome, Texas.

Photo: Brandon Bell / Getty Images

Following the ruling of a federal judge that prevents the Joe Biden government from ceasing to implement the Title 42, and that the White House assures that it will appeal, a common denominator runs through the press reports these days: with the measure or without it, migrants will continue to arrive at the border, hoping to request asylum at some point.

That seems to be a logic of pure survival that anti-immigrants —among politicians, officials and part of American society— will never be able to understand or accept. Because there may be thousands of obstacles along the way, but for someone who seeks to leave behind what martyrs their existence and that of their loved ones, there is no barrier that prevents them from at least trying.

Indeed, in several border cities there are thousands of migrants waiting because, with Title 42 or without him, they will keep coming. In fact, one of the fallacies that Republicans and some moderate Democrats wield is that the elimination of the Title 40 would generate “chaos on the border” before the massive arrival of migrants. Hence, they insist on clinging to this sanitary measure, activated by the Covid- pandemic, to deal with migratory challenges, without a high-level debate in Congress to approve or reject legislation.

It is, plain and simple, a kind of give and take at the legislative level, in which thousands of human lives in total vulnerability are used as part of that perverse game of political conveniences, where the most “important” thing is to defeat the opponent in turn, either in the stands or in the press, putting these migrants in the middle as an ideological stratagem, both to defend them and to attack them. And meanwhile, those migrants are always, unfortunately, in migratory limbo.

In other words, the Title 42 has served as a weapon for those politicians, who for decades have dedicated themselves to obstructing a comprehensive immigration reform that, in addition to legalizing undocumented immigrants, addresses the obsolete asylum laws that govern in this country. Moreover, the Title 42 has made it possible to further undermine these asylum laws, preventing the entry, especially of foreigners from Latin American, Caribbean and African countries, among others, just as this phenomenon began to occur during the Trump administration, also revealing that xenophobic side that the application of said policy of evident exclusion entails from the beginning.

Thus, the cynicism of these politicians has no limits. The deadline to delete the Title 42 was not yet in force, this past 21 in May, when they were already arguing that there was a “crisis at the border.” If with the Title 80 there was already a “crisis”, then why cling to a sanitary measure to deal with the disaster that is the laws of immigration in the supposedly most powerful nation on the planet? Why not legislate?

The answer is simple. Because it is easier to exploit the issue for political purposes, than to have the pants and skirts on to make difficult decisions and reform an immigration system that does not correspond to the reality of this century 19. It is easier to resort to demagoguery than to do the job for which they were supposedly elected.

“May they one day put themselves in our shoes”, says as a message to US legislators an undocumented immigrant interviewed by the Telemundo network in a shelter in the Mexican city of Reynosa, where she awaits an opportunity to apply for asylum. “That they help us because we are humble people with a heart willing to work”. authentic that only wants an opportunity to show what each generation of migrants has done not only for this country, but for the one that has welcomed them from time to time, throughout the entire history of humanity.

But even the lack of guts of those legislators is such that, when talking about the border and handling thousands of asylum seekers daily, it seems that this is an undeveloped nation, unable to deal with a rise in the number of migrants.

This contrasts with the petulance that they usually show in Congress, where the United States is the “top dog” capable of handling anything. Right now, with the crisis of the shortage of baby formula, a congresswoman commented on one of the cable programs that seeing empty shelves in supermarkets and pharmacies was inconceivable because “this is the United States of America”.

Well, if this is the United States of America, they should behave as part of a developed nation and be able to face the challenges that really matter from the point of view of humanitarian emergencies, for example, they have just approved the shipment of 40 one billion dollars! for the armed conflict in Ukraine, but apparently they cannot attend to an increase in migrants on the border with Mexico.

Because the reality is that with Title 42 or without it migrants will continue to arrive, especially now that summer begins, when the numbers skyrocket. Because they not only seek asylum —since many come from countries allied with the United States and the possibility of obtaining that benefit is remote—, but also, like so many others, they flee misery, violence in all its manifestations.

These are the situations that lead them to cross deserts and navigate shark-infested waters in precarious boats. If they survive the journeys and are later deported, they try again. With Title 42 or without it.