Thread: US, Mexico agree on plan to handle migrant caravan from Central America

US, Mexico agree on plan to handle migrant caravan from Central America

By Elizabeth Zwirz, John Roberts | Fox News
Published 1 hour ago
Last Update 13 mins ago

U.S. and Mexican officials have agreed on a plan to handle the approaching migrant caravan making their way up from Central America, a senior administration official told Fox News on Thursday.

Under the deal, which was developed over the course of several months, Mexico requested that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) establish shelters along its southern border with Central America, the official said.

Mexican Ambassador to the U.S. Geronimo Gutierrez elaborated on the request, during an interview on Fox News’ “Special Report.”

“Just today, the Mexican government, and this is a very important step, requested the intervention of the U.N., the Office of the High Commissioner on Refugees, to help Mexico review any asylum claims from the members of the caravan,” Gutierrez said. “That will allow us to have a process by which in our border we will make sure that of serving human rights, respecting international law, if there are legitimate claims to refugee, those can be processed in a very clear way.”

Gutierrez also retweeted a news release Thursday detailing Mexico’s request to the UNHCR.

“We welcome the government of Mexico’s statement that they will seek cooperation with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to address immigration issues in the region, including the influx of people arriving in Mexico,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement. “The United States stands ready to assist the Government of Mexico and UNHCR in this effort.”

If an individual manages to evade the new system and travels through Mexico to eventually cross the border into the U.S., Mexico will now allow those persons to be returned to Mexico, the official told Fox News. Currently, the U.S. has had to house those people until their cases could be adjudicated before being removed to their country of origin.

At the established shelters, U.N. officials will vet the refugees to decide which ones have legitimate claims for refugee status, the official told Fox News.

If a person or persons is determined to have a legitimate claim, they will undergo a U.N. process of being placed in a host country, which could ultimately be the U.S. or any other country that has an agreement with the UNHCR, the official said.

All those discovered without a legitimate claim will be sent home, the official said. And those who don’t have correct documentation will be turned away at the Mexico border.

The plan was agreed on by members of Mexico President Enrique Pena Nieto’s government, however President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s incoming administration has vowed not to criticize the plan, the official said. After they take office, they have agreed to work together with the U.S. to attempt to make the plan endure long-term.

The caravan, which started in Honduras last week, is currently bound for the U.S. As of Thursday, a migrant shelter located on the Guatemalan side of the border with Mexico said that hundreds of the caravan’s migrants had reached the area, according to The Associated Press.

The caravan drew the ire of President Trump earlier Thursday on Twitter, who threatened military force and a closure of the U.S. southern border. He also slammed leaders in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador for “doing little to stop this large flow of people” and requested that Mexico “stop this onslaught.”

Fox News’ Greg Norman, Nicholas Kalman and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/us-...entral-america

Cool. Now if they come in they'll come in through the UN and be applied to our "refugee" numbers which has a cap set by the ... President! Plus they'll be sent all over the world, not to US.



Damn!! That's good!!

Hey, we should be doing that with all of them, even when they show up at our Ports of Entry. Call the UN Refugee Program to deal with them.

If a person or persons is determined to have a legitimate claim, they will undergo a U.N. process of being placed in a host country, which could ultimately be the U.S. or any other country that has an agreement with the UNHCR, the official said.

Hmm, so now they can come here as refugees instead of illegals and asylum seekers. Now, when the UNHCR decides to send them to us the Trump administration can say they're here legally. We all know these so called refugees will request to come here because this is where many of their friends and relatives are!

Personally, I'm not going to get too excited about this deal until I hear more details and see how it works out.

U.S. to sharply limit refugee flows to 30,000 in 2019

Lesley Wroughton
September 17, 2018 / 5:38 PM / a month ago

4 Min Read

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Monday the United States would cap the number of refugees allowed into the country at 30,000 for fiscal-year 2019, a sharp drop from a limit of 45,000 it set for 2018.

“We proposed resettling up to 30,000 refugees under the new refugee ceiling as well as processing more than 280,000 asylum seekers,” Pompeo said in an announcement at the State Department, calling the United States “the most generous nation in the world when it comes to protection-based immigration.”

“This year’s proposed refugee ceiling must be considered in the context of the many other forms of protection and assistance offered by the United States,” he said.

Refugee advocates quickly condemned the lower cap.

“Today’s announcement ... is a shameful abdication of our humanity in the face of the worst refugee crisis in history,” Jennifer Quigley, of Human Rights First, said in a statement.

Senator Bob Menendez, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called the decision “cruel and short sighted.” He said reducing the cap would “do untold damage to our nation’s values and countless lives across the world.”

Pompeo said the new limit reflected the administration’s preference for settling refugees closer to their home countries, something President Donald Trump has said would be cheaper than admitting them to the United States.

Pompeo said the decision was also based on security concerns. “We must continue to responsibly vet applicants to prevent the entry of those who might do harm to our country,” he said.

Officials at the State Department and the Pentagon initially supported maintaining the cap at 45,000, according to one former and one current official. It was unclear whether they changed their position as the debate proceeded or failed to persuade the White House.

The refugee ceiling of 45,000 set last year was the lowest since 1980, when the modern refugee program was established. The United States is on track to admit only 22,000 refugees this year, about half the maximum allowed.

Trump campaigned in 2016 promising tight restrictions on immigration, and his administration has sharply reduced refugee admissions through executive orders and closed-door decisions in the past year and a half.

IMBALANCES

In the past year, the administration has tightened security vetting procedures that current and former officials say have slowed admission of refugees.

Ryan Mace, a refugee specialist at Amnesty International USA, urged Congress to oppose the decision as it finalizes fiscal-year 2019 appropriations.

“The Trump administration is abandoning this country’s promise to refugees,” said Mace. “Today’s announcement demonstrates another undeniable political attack against people who have been forced to flee their homes.”

In addition to far lower admissions overall, the type of refugee admitted has changed under Trump, a Reuters analysis of government data shows. The percentage who are Muslim is now a third what it was two years ago, while the percentage who are Europeans has tripled.

The shift has led to striking imbalances. Refugees admitted to the United States from the small European country of Moldova, for example, now outnumber those from Syria by three to one, although the number of Syrian refugees worldwide outnumbers the total population of Moldova.

Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Additional reporting by Yeganeh Torbati; Editing by Peter Cooney and Dan Grebler

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-u...-idUSKCN1LX2HS

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This is a very, very smart President. I can just hear Trump in the meetings, "what's the damn difference between an asylum-seeker and a refugee"? Uuuh, duuuh. Trump "that's what I thought, run them all through the refugee program where I have control of the caps, and can limit the number of these people coming in here." OKAY!!

We have our quota!

Do not send any of them here!

Go diversify some other country!

Terminate this agreement!

"If an individual manages to evade the new system and travels through Mexico to eventually cross the border into the U.S., Mexico will now allow those persons to be returned to Mexico, the official told Fox News. "

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Make this effective immediately!

NOW means now! Right this minute!

Trump...send the memo to Border Patrol to process them and return them as quickly as possible!

Turn them right back around!

No more turning yourselves in at our Ports of Entry!

And WE are not responsible to take in any more people from Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras or Guatemala!

The UNHCR can ship them to Africa!

Anywhere but here!

WE HAVE TAKEN OUR FAIR SHARE FOR DECADES...PASS THE BATON!

Originally Posted by Beezer

"If an individual manages to evade the new system and travels through Mexico to eventually cross the border into the U.S., Mexico will now allow those persons to be returned to Mexico, the official told Fox News. "

---------------------



Make this effective immediately!

NOW means now! Right this minute!

Trump...send the memo to Border Patrol to process them and return them as quickly as possible!

Turn them right back around!

No more turning yourselves in at our Ports of Entry!

And WE are not responsible to take in any more people from Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras or Guatemala!

The UNHCR can ship them to Africa!

Anywhere but here!

WE HAVE TAKEN OUR FAIR SHARE FOR DECADES...PASS THE BATON!

This is a huge change, because this will allow Border Patrol to turn around all OTM's (Other Than Mexicans) who came in through Mexico back into Mexico.

We have 30 MILLION to deport.

Not one of them can come here under this agreement!



And the ones currently at Ports of Entry need to be bused back to this processing center at Mexico's southern border!

Trump...send the memo effective IMMEDIATELY...they get bused back to this processing center!

Send buses to our Ports of Entry NOW! Load them up and ship them out.

We have a massive backlog!!! We want them processed within 24 hours and deported home or to the processing center in Mexico!

Give them 3 choices:

1) You go to Africa...go diversity Africa!

2) You go to Russia...go diversify Russia!

3) OR you go home, take YOUR Flag, quit your whining and fight to fix your own country!


YOU COWARDS GO HOME AND FIX YOUR OWN COUNTRY BEFORE WE SHIP YOU OFF TO YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE!


VAMANOS!

Yes, they should start now. This is really HUUGE news. I think it was part of the USMCA. So glad to see Mexico is agreeing to start it now and not waiting until December.