Mexico and other countries could hinder Trump’s border plans

President Donald Trump’s plans to seal the U.S.-Mexico border and carry out mass deportations may soon hit a major roadblock: Mexico and the countries where the immigrants come from may not accept some of them back.

Trump signed an order on Monday to revive the “Rest in Mexico” policy, which includes asylum seekers outside the United States when processing their claims. But on the US-Mexico border front, which requires a certain level of cooperation from the Mexican government, which appears resistant.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum told reporters on Wednesday that she has not agreed to accept non-Mexican migrants seeking asylum in the United States and such a move would require approval from Mexico, according to the report in Reuters.

An expert at a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday listed other countries that have refused to take back migrants such as Cuba, Venezuela, China, India, Bangladesh and Iran.

Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan, the top Democrat on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said Thursday that helping Mexico work with the rest of Mexico’s politics can be “very problematic.”

“It’s really hard to actually implement this program if the Mexican government doesn’t agree, and I don’t think we can take it for granted that they’re going to agree,” Peters said.

Peters also said the issue of Mexico being forced to accept migrants not from the Western Hemisphere, such as China, “also complicates things.”

“The type of migration we see is different and comes from outside Latin America,” Peters said. “Not entirely, but increasing numbers are coming from outside Latin America. People fly to Mexico. People fly to Canada, they fly to other countries and then they climb over the border. “

Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla.

“These are people who come from Tajikistan and other areas that the Mexicans will not take back,” Lankford said. “These are stubborn countries that won’t take people back.”

In fiscal year 2024, Border Patrol detected nearly 38,000 nationals from China entering the United States illegally from Mexico, a steep increase from the 2,200 in all of fiscal year 2022.

According to Lankford, international organizations like ISIS send people from Tajikistan out of Mexico because they saw that the drug cartels had success with immigrants to the United States.

The senator concluded that “some sort of legal response” is needed, including a legislative change that would give the State Department the authority to pressure some of those countries as well.

Sen. Rick Scott, R-Fla.

“They come to Mexico and then to the United States – why shouldn’t that be Mexico’s problem?” Scott said. “Why shouldn’t we just say, ‘You’re the one letting them into your country?’ Why (is it) our problem? It’s their problem. They raise their tariffs until they do. “

The previous versions of the Remal in Mexico policy had some degree of unification by Mexico, some of it the result of the kind of tactics Scott mentioned.

Back to ‘stay’

In his first term, Trump announced the rest in Mexico policy in 2018 with the cooperation of then-President of Mexico Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

The reasoning behind why Mexico initially agreed to accept migrants under the program in 2018 is unclear, Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, said Thursday.

“We don’t really know,” Reichlin-Melnick said. “In fact, there was a lot of confusion about what the specific boundaries of the deal were, and we’re still not entirely clear.”

While the program was initially limited to one entry point and certain nationalities, Trump’s threat in 2019 for 25 percent tariffs led Mexico to agree to expand it further, Reichlin-Melnick said.

“So clear that Mexico played a significant role in deciding the limits of the program,” Reichlin-Melnick said. “Despite this, the official position of the Mexican government has always been: ‘This actually has nothing to do with us.’ We didn’t choose that. ‘”

Although Trump has said Mexico agreed with him, the Mexican government has not, Reichlin-Melnick said.

“We don’t fully agree,” Reichlin-Melnick said. “What does that actually mean? There’s a bit more confusion and we’re waiting to hear more from the Trump administration about how the program will come back, who it will apply to, and when. “

Ariel Ruiz, senior policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute, said whether Mexico agrees to the policy again in 2025 depends on new factors because the “negotiating landscape between Mexico and the United States is very different.”

“Mexico has detained more migrants in Mexico since May than it has border patrol at the U.S.-Mexico border,” Ruiz said. “And that’s a really significant achievement because Mexico has a fraction of the funding that U.S. agencies will receive.”

Doris Meissner, director of the U.S. immigration policy program at the Migration Policy Institute, said during a conference call Tuesday that Trump’s continued “really hampering” cooperation between the United States and Mexico on the return of migrants could “really hinder.”

“The issue of tariffs in Mexico imposing 25 percent soon and renaming the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America. Threats to retake the Panama Canal will make it much more difficult for these countries to cooperate with the United States in the future,” Meissner said . “So there are these obstacles and these internal tensions, similar to mass deportations.”

Other problems

The human cost of forcing migrants to return outside the U.S.-Mexico border is another factor at play. Critics of the policy remain essentially asylum seekers at the whims of drug cartels that exploit migrants for money, rape and kidnapping.

Adam Isacson, director of defense oversight in the Washington office in Latin America, testified at last week’s Senate hearing that the policy turned migrants into “sitting ducks for the cartels.”

“Foreigners only have to pay for a long time in cartel-dominated districts,” said Isacson. “If you don’t pay, it’s not safe to go outside your shelter, even with the United States helping out.”

Kenneth Cuccinelli, a top Homeland Security official during the first Trump administration, said at a Senate hearing last week that Mexico has long had a “very permissive entry,” but he agreed with Scott “100 percent” that a tougher approach may Maage may be the best.

“I think Mexico would finally develop some screening for people coming into Mexico if we dropped everyone back into Mexico. And I’m sure there are people in this room (who) wouldn’t like that, and it would be ugly for a period of time,” Cuccinelli said. “But if people knew that they couldn’t get into the United States and they wouldn’t be allowed to wait the 1,013 days for the hearing for which they wouldn’t show up, they won’t come in the first place. ”

Under questioning from Rep. Tom Tiffany, R-Wis., at a House hearing on Wednesday, a witness said the State Department was not required to withhold visas from countries that do not accept these migrants.

“The State Department has historically been reluctant to use visa sanctions to impose consequences on countries that do not meet their international obligation to take back their citizens,” said Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies at the Center for Immigration Studies.

Congress could pass a law to require the executive branch to use visa sanctions or other diplomatic tools such as withholding foreign assistance, Vaughan said.