US, Mexico meet over migration surge
Blinken wants his counterparts to curb crossings
MEXICO CITY — A top US delegation met with Mexico’s president Wednesday in what many saw as an attempt to have Mexico do more to limit a surge of migrants reaching the US southwestern border.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has said he is willing to help, but he wants to see progress in US relations with Cuba and Venezuela, two of the top sources of migrants, along with more development aid for the region.
But Mexico's top priority appeared to be getting the United States to reopen border crossings that were closed because of the migrant surge.
“We spoke about the importance of the border, and about the economic relationship ... the importance of reopening the border crossings, that is a priority for us,” Foreign Relations Secretary Alicia Bárcena said after the meeting.
Both sides in the talks face pressure to reach an agreement after past steps like limiting direct travel into Mexico or deporting some migrants failed to stop the influx. This month, as many as 10,000 migrants were arrested daily at the southwest US border.
The US has struggled to process thousands of migrants at the border, and house them once they reach northern cities. And Mexican industries were stung last week when the US briefly closed two vital Texas railway crossings, arguing that border patrol agents had to be reassigned to deal with the surge. Another non-rail border crossing remained closed in Lukeville, Ariz., and operations were partially suspended in San Diego and Nogales, Ariz.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken left open the possibility that those crossings could be reopened if Mexico provides more help.
“Secretary Blinken will discuss unprecedented irregular migration in the Western Hemisphere and identify ways Mexico and the United States will address border security challenges, including actions to enable the reopening of key ports of entry across our shared border,” his office said.
Mexico says it detected 680,000 migrants moving through the country in the first 11 months of 2023.
Mexico has assigned over 32,000 military troops and National Guard officers — about 11 percent of its total forces — to enforce immigration laws, and the National Guard now detains far more migrants than criminals.
But the shortcomings of that approach were on display Tuesday, when National Guard officers made no attempt to stop a caravan of about 6,000 migrants, many from Central America and Venezuela, from walking through Mexico's main inland immigration inspection point in southern Chiapas state near the Guatemala border.
In the past, Mexico has let such caravans go through, trusting that they would tire themselves out walking along the highway.
But wearing the migrants out no longer appears to work.
So many migrants have been hopping freight trains through Mexico that one of the country's two major railroad companies suspended trains in September because of safety concerns. Police raids to pull migrants off railway cars — the kind of action Mexico took a decade ago — might be one thing the American delegation would like to see.