On Friday June 6th, the Trump administration and Mexican officials signed an agreement regarding the immigration policy.
What We Know:
- In an effort to force Mexico to do something about illegal immigration, the Trump administration threatened to impose new tariffs. These tariffs would have caused a 5% tax on all imported Mexican goods and this would increase regularly up to 25%. The goal was to get Mexico to decrease the amount of asylum seekers and immigrants.
- Despite Trump announcing that the tariffs would take effect on June 10th, a decision had already been reached in March. Negotiations were made between Olga Sanchez, the Mexican Interior Secretary, and the former Secretary of Homeland Security, Kirstjen Neilson. The discussion was held in Miami but it was officially agreed upon on June 6th.
- As a part of the deal made in March, Mexico agreed to send 1000 members of their National Guard to the Mexico-Guatemala border. This would hopefully help decrease the amount Central American asylum seekers. This had been completed in May. Now, they have agreed to send a total of 6000 National Guard members around the country to combat immigration. Mexico has also agreed to provide “jobs, healthcare, and education according to its principles” to asylum seekers awaiting the processing of their claims.
- The US agrees to speed up the processing of asylum claims. Currently this process takes from six months up to a few years. The US also agrees to expand its “Migration Protection Protocols”. This is a policy that sends asylum seekers back to Mexico to wait as their claim is processed by US officials. Unfortunately, they have to be waiting in Mexico for 45 days before the claim can even be presented to the US immigration court. The US also agrees to speed up the processing of distribution of $5.8 billion in funds to address the problems that are causing migrants to leave their homes and seek asylum in the US.
Despite Trump’s positive tweets, the deal has not been finalized and the Trump administration is still waiting to see if Mexico will follow through with their end of the deal.
