The Government of the United States announced this Wednesday that it will impose new measures to control Venezuelan migration, which will allow immediate expulsion of those who enter through the border with Mexico.
The United States announced this Wednesday new measures to control Venezuelan migration: a program that gives legal status for two years to those who arrive by plane and the immediate expulsion of most of those who cross the border through Mexico.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) reported the creation of a new immigration relief for Venezuelans, similar to the one that already exists for citizens of Ukraine, which grants a two-year temporary status to those who have a sponsor in USA.
In parallel, DHS will return to Mexico to the majority of Venezuelans who are intercepted after crossing the southern border; The expulsions will be carried out under Title 42, a public health regulation imposed at the beginning of the pandemic and inherited from the Administration of former President Donald Trump (2017-2021).
“Those who try to cross the southern border of the United States illegally will be returned to Mexico and will not be able to apply for this program in the future,” Secretary of National Security Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement on Wednesday.
The measures are intended to “reduce the number of people who arrive at the border” irregularly and create a “more orderly” migration process for Venezuelans fleeing the “humanitarian and economic crisis in their country”assured a US government official in a press call.
Under this immigration program, from which deportees from the US in the last five years or people who have entered Panama or Mexico irregularly are excluded, the US government will initially accept 24,000 people, the official said. People who have a permanent residence or nationality of a country other than Venezuela will not be accepted either.
To apply to the program, interested Venezuelans must demonstrate that they have a sponsor who has a legal immigration status in the US and that can prove that it has the financial resources for the period of time that the migrants are going to reside in the country.
In addition, recipients must pass a “national security and public safety” screening, DHS said in a statement.
The US announcement comes amid an increase in the arrival of Venezuelans at the border with Mexico. Between October 2021 and August of this year, more than 150,000 Venezuelans have been arrested on the US southern border, compared to 50,499 in the same period last year.
Only in August Some 25,000 Venezuelans were intercepted by US authorities at the border, according to data from the US Customs and Border Protection Office.
Unlike the program for Venezuelans, The US did not establish a maximum number of people who can receive immigration relief for Ukrainians, which was announced in April and from which some 65,000 people have benefited, according to the latest available data.
More than 6.1 million Venezuelans have left their country, in what is the second largest migration crisis in the world, second only to that of Syria, according to the organization Refugees International.