Illegal Immigrants Can’t Reach The Southern Border Of The United States Without Traveling Through Mexico

It seems a rather obvious point, but illegal immigrants entering America through our porous southern border have to go through Mexico to get to that border. That is the reason it makes sense to involve Mexico in the process of securing our southern border.

First of all, let’s look at the increase in the number of people attempting to cross our southern border. The chart below is from U.S. Customs and Border Protection:

As you can see, the total apprehensions have increased dramatically in the past two years.

On June 1st, American Greatness posted an article with some suggested solutions to the problem. The article includes a list of how Mexico can become part of the solution rather than part of the problem.

The article reports:

On Thursday, the administration rolled out a new policy aimed at encouraging Mexico to do more to crack down on the thousands of Central American migrants passing through their country on the way to the United States to claim asylum.

Acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan described the three efforts the United States wants to see from Mexico:

    • More vigorous efforts by Mexico to secure the border between Guatemala and the Mexican state of Chiapas. The Guatemala-Chiapas border is approximately 500 miles—small as borders go. For comparison, the U.S.-Mexico border is close to 2,000 miles.
    • A crackdown on the organizations that help migrants travel through Mexico to the United States. These organizations range from the criminal—a RAND corporation study estimates that Central American cartels made $2.3 billion on human trafficking across the U.S.-Mexico border in 2017—to the activist groups organizing massive surges toward the U.S., to the bus lines that have arisen to facilitate entrance to the U.S. There’s a reason why more migrants are appearing in large groups—Customs and Border Enforcement report that they’ve found 180 groups of more than 100 people since October, compared to only 13 in the previous 12-month period, and only two the year before.
    • Finally, McAleenan says he wants “align with Mexico on asylum.” This is a reference to the “safe third country” agreement that is common practice throughout the rest of the world, but with which Mexico refuses to engage.

The article notes the rules on aslyum:

This is where the “safe third country” doctrine comes in. Under international law known as the Dublin Regulation, migrants seeking asylum are required to claim it in the first safe country they enter. The theory behind this is that if migrants are truly seeking shelter from persecution, rather than simply trying to use the system to reach a specific destination, they will stop in the first place they find relief.

One interesting aspect of this is that the migrants would be more culturally compatible with Mexico than America. Mexico speaks Spanish, their native language. America speaks English (or some form of it).

At any rate, it is time for a solution. I hope the tariffs the Trump administration is threatening to impose provide an incentive for Mexico to help stop the flow of illegal drugs and immigrants at our southern border.