ImmigrationCOVID Slows Central America-U.S. Migration
From March to April, when the U.S. began to lock down, total apprehensions along its southern border dropped by 50 percent, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data. Apprehensions and expulsions have plummeted, going from 109,415 in April 2019 to just 16,789 in April 2020.
For years, Cruz Pelico made a living by tending to onions, carrots and lettuce in the rolling fields outside his small Guatemalan town. But even with the long, labor-intensive hours, the 25-year-old farmer struggled to support his wife and 5-year-old son.
So in 2019 he began planning to migrate to the United States to lift his family out of poverty.
But as coronavirus tears through the U.S. and lockdowns cut off migrant pathways, Pelico dropped his plans to migrate.
“I’m not thinking about going anymore. With this situation, you can’t get there now,” Pelico said. “The United States has fallen into crisis, too. Many Guatemalans who are there have told me,” he said. “There’s no work anymore. I’ve started thinking it’s better to be here.”
Instead of embarking on their journeys northward as people in his town, Zuníl, had done for decades, Pelico said recently departed Guatemalans were returning out of fear. It is unprecedented for a town whose economy was sculpted by generations of migration.
Deterred
Zuníl’s situation is not unique. Migration northward is dropping off across the region as rising obstacles — fear of contagion, lack of work in the U.S., mobility restrictions and the Trump administration’s restrictions on migration during the pandemic — have made the journey all but impossible.
“They never made it,” Pelico said. “They are returning because they were scared of this pandemic we’re suffering, because of everything happening in the United States.”
That could be disastrous for tens of thousands of Central American and Mexican migrants who have fled not just poverty but also an onslaught of violence in recent years.
From March to April, when the U.S. began to lock down, total apprehensions along its southern border dropped by 50 percent, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data.
Apprehensions and expulsions have plummeted, going from 109,415 in April 2019 to just 16,789 in April 2020. At the same time, Trump administration officials announced they would indefinitely extend border restrictions made during the pandemic.
The order from Robert Redfield, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director, allows the administration to rapidly expel asylum-seekers and immigrants, including unaccompanied minors, crossing the border.
