Trump administration to immediately deport new Central American asylum seekers to Mexico

 

Trump administration to immediately deport new Central American asylum seekers to Mexico

By
Eric London

21 December 2018

The Trump administration announced a new policy that effectively guts the right of asylum for refugees from Central America. From now on, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) will begin expelling non-Mexican refugees as soon as they have made application for asylum after crossing the US-Mexico border. They will be immediately deported to Mexico instead of being allowed to stay in the US pending the adjudication of their asylum claims.

The Mexican government, taking its orders from Washington, will not oppose these deportations or bring any legal action against the United States for a policy that is in flagrant violation of international law. Its only concession to the refugees is that Mexico will not confine them in US-style detention camps.

The asylum seekers will be “free” to share the miserable conditions of life in impoverished neighborhoods of violence-wracked border cities like Tijuana, Juarez, Laredo and Matamoros. Hundreds of thousands of impoverished immigrants—including children—will now be forced to live in makeshift slums and tent encampments.

The new policy is a historically unprecedented attack on Central American workers and peasants escaping violence and inequality caused by decades of US imperialist intervention and corporate exploitation. Never before has the US denied the democratic right to seek asylum to so many in one fell swoop.

The policy was announced on the same day that President Trump said he would not sign a new continuing resolution, funding about one-fourth of the federal government, without $5 billion allotted to begin full-scale construction of a wall along the US-Mexico border.

The resolution, passed by the…

Read more