Mexico has a strategy for dealing with Trump’s wall and rejection of migrants

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has a strategy to cope with Central American caravans as well as President Donald Trump’s push for a border wall and aversion to migrants.

That was the message from Mexico’s first female ambassador to the United States, Martha Bárcena Coqui. She recently spoke at a global business conference in Philadelphia.

Known at home as AMLO, the leftist Mexican president (in office since December) has surprised U.S. observers who expected him to quickly ignite fireworks with Trump. Instead, Mexican authorities have blocked groups of migrants at border towns. They also have permitted the Trump administration to send back several dozen migrants awaiting U.S. court decisions on their asylum applications.

But, Bárcena told me, AMLO’s stance is part of a much broader Mexican approach on immigration. Mexican officials are discussing their views with top U.S. officials, members of Congress, governors and relevant city mayors.

Any debate on immigration, Bárcena insists, “should be based on facts and realities.” So here are some facts on the immigration dispute the Mexican government wants you to know.

Study U.S., Mexico and Central America demographics as one region. Bárcena notes the U.S. is aging fast, while Mexico and Central America are still youthful. This feeds migration north for jobs.

“Circular migration” — or legal guest-worker program — is crucial to meeting migration demand. From 1942-1964, the bracero program permitted Mexican laborers to enter the U.S. for seasonal work, and then return home. When that ended “Mexicans continued to come because there were job opportunities,” says Bárcena. Today, H2A visas permit seasonal agricultural workers to enter and H2B visas (capped at 66,000) allow nonagricultural workers in when needed. But the programs aren’t always reliable, and need updating.

For example, last year nearly half the Eastern Shore of Maryland’s crab houses had no workers to pick the meat for restaurants and supermarkets, because they couldn’t secure H2B visas for their longtime seasonal employees from Mexico. Similarly, mushroom growers in Chester County were short 1,000 longtime Mexican seasonal workers, because they couldn’t obtain H2A visas for temporary work.

Fewer and fewer illegal Mexican workers are entering the U.S. (in fact, there has been net outmigration), but longtime seasonal workers may not go home if their return becomes uncertain. “If there is no reliability for visas, people will stay,” Bárcena says.

Address root causes of illegal immigration in Central America.

“People mostly migrate because they have no options,” the ambassador says. “Sixty percent from Central America come from rural areas suffering huge drought.” Others are fleeing gang violence. “If we can change the economy of the poorest areas of the region — from southern Mexico through Central America — and achieve sustained economic growth, then people will stay,” argues Bárcena. That will require joint U.S.-Mexican efforts. “Police measures to contain or deter can be useful in the shortterm, but not the medium- or long-term.”

AMLO is cooperating with Trump on migrants for pragmatic reasons, taking back some asylum seekers and limiting the numbers who cross the border. However, this cannot be a longterm, or expanded, solution. Mexican facilities are already strained by the dozens they accepted while awaiting U.S. court decisions.

Instead, AMLO would like to see the number of legal ports of entry increased, and measures to speed up the legal flow, such as the use of huge security scanners.

When I asked Bárcena her opinion on “the wall,” she replied, “Is a concrete wall helpful anywhere?”