The end of catch and release?
I’m shocked, and for once it’s the good kind of shocked. Read yesterday’s post for background if you haven’t already. How on earth did the White House convince Mexico’s new populist left-wing president to go for this?
According to outlines of the plan, known as Remain in Mexico, asylum applicants at the border will have to stay in Mexico while their cases are processed, potentially ending the system Trump decries as “catch and release” that has until now generally allowed those seeking refuge to wait on safer U. S. soil.
“For now, we have agreed to this policy of Remain in Mexico,” said Olga Sánchez Cordero, Mexico’s incoming interior minister, the top domestic policy official for López Obrador, who takes office Dec. 1. In an interview with The Washington Post, she called it a “short-term solution.”…
U. S. officials involved in the talks said Mexico has not asked for financial assistance to implement the new procedures, which could result in significant costs if asylum seekers are made to wait for months or years. They described the deal as a collaboration, and senior officials from both governments insisted it was not imposed upon Mexico.
The status quo: An asylum-seeker surrenders to U. S. authorities, they apply for asylum, and they’re either detained while they wait or, given the paucity of detention facilities, they’re released into the United States with orders to show up for their asylum hearing. Some will, some won’t. The new process: An asylum-seeker surrenders to U. S. authorities, they go to the federal courthouse for an initial asylum hearing, and if the judge doesn’t rule then and there then they go back over the border to Mexico to wait for a determination. No more catch and release.
What’s the catch, though? If we’re not bribing Mexico to do this, what’s in it for them? Hmmmm:
A group of business leaders in [Tijuana] said they have thousands of job openings at the city’s assembly plants, or maquiladoras, inviting Central American migrants to work in the factories.
