In my last post I wrote the following:
“Illegal immigrants are just as capable as anyone when it comes to reading the news. They can see Biden’s polling numbers. The time to enter is clearly going to be before next year if Trump returns to power and closes the border.”
That has proven to be incorrect. Apprehensions at the border are down significantly. Why?
First, a little background:
In 2019 Mexico was rolling out its new National Guard in response to horrific drug violence. Trump had other ideas though and a little blackmail was enough to convince Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador that the country’s new paramilitary was better put to use slowing illegal immigration into the United States. (For that reason I like to say that Trump really did force Mexico to build the wall—or at least a wall.)
The obvious question is if it worked so well for Trump why not keep on doing it? Lo and behold:
In brief the Biden administration conducted a diplomatic mission to Mexico City over Christmas. In the aftermath of that visit Mexican authorities have stepped up immigration enforcement in a manner suspiciously reminiscent of the Trump years. The Mexican news media is full of stories of illegal immigrants being relocated to large camps in the southern part of the country where they will be expected to either leave or wait for the Mexican government’s painfully slow bureaucracy to issue them a permit to travel internally. Camps are being dismantled and replaced with large “anti-pedestrian trenches”.
A couple of points:
The southern border is a big deal right now and yet American news media is apparently asleep at the wheel.
It’s a cinch that in a few months Democrats will be crowing about the drop in apprehensions at the southern border and giving credit to Biden. And Biden will indeed deserve credit but there is a lot of room for nuance here: there was nothing really stopping him from just continuing Trump’s policies from day one. As it is illegal immigration has become an existential threat to both a) Biden’s prospects for reelection and b) the municipal budgets of cities like Chicago, New York and Denver. Regardless there will no doubt be claims that Biden has mysteriously done something to alleviate the unfortunate domestic conditions in places like Guatemala when the reality is that he resurrected a Trump policy that relies almost completely on enforcement.