NOORANI'S NOTES

 

 

Signs of "Trump-era problems" continue at the U.S.-Mexico border, Nomaan
Merchant at the Associated Press
 reports.  

Merchant tells the story of Nailet, a Cuban asylum seeker who
was detained with her newborn son for six days - "twice as long as
federal rules generally allow" - in a Border Patrol holding
facility often referred to as the "icebox."  

With large numbers of families crossing the U.S.-Mexico border in the
first few weeks of the Biden administration, "[w]arning signs are
emerging of the border crises that marked former President Donald
Trump's term: Hundreds of newly released immigrants are getting
dropped off with nonprofit groups, sometimes unexpectedly, and accounts
like Nailet's of prolonged detention in short-term facilities are
growing." 

Meanwhile, The Washington Post
's
Nick Miroff reports that authorities "made nearly 78,000 arrests and
detentions along the border with Mexico in January - the highest
number for that month in at least a decade and more than double the
amount from a year earlier." However, Miroff notes that the number of
families arriving at the border "remains far below levels tallied during
a record influx in 2019."

Keep in mind that discerning migration trends is more difficult amid
"soaring levels" of repeat crossing attempts, as some encounters
represent the same individual trying to cross multiple times. And  in
response to the new numbers, WOLA 's Adam
Isacson tweeted a helpful visual
. 

There is a lot of nuance to what is happening along the border. There is
not a migration crisis at the border, there is a leadership crisis
within U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and
Border Protection (CBP) that the Biden administration needs to
address ASAP. 

In other news: NBC

reports that the Biden administration will name Michelle Brané,
director of migrant rights and justice at the Women's Refugee
Commission, as the executive director of the much-anticipated task
force to reunite families who were separated at the border. 

Welcome to Thursday's edition of Noorani's Notes. If you
have a story to share from your own community, please send it to
me at [email protected]
. 

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**BORDER TRAUMA **- Asylum seekers are enduring a mental health
crisis as they remain stranded at the U.S.-Mexico border waiting for
an immigration process to restart, reports Emily Green of VICE
. Santiago,
a 4-year-old boy confined with his father to a one-room apartment in a
dangerous border town, wakes up crying nearly every night: "My
family, my family." He is among the thousands of people still affected
by the Trump administration's Migrant Protection Protocols
 (MPP) or
"Remain in Mexico" policy. César José Barrios Pichardo, a
psychologist with Doctors without Borders
, has spent two years offering
therapy sessions to asylum seekers in the border town
of Matamoros. "At the beginning we saw a lot more acute stress,"
Barrios Pichardo said. "Now, the depression is almost structural.
Infinite waiting, constant changes, the lack of a stable process."  

**THE KOUADIO FAMILY** - While Biden has already taken action to
address several of Trump's anti-immigrant policies, "activists say
Biden must do more to prove his commitment to meaningful change,"
reports Amanda Holpuch for The Guardian
. Until
further changes are made, the fate of those like the Kouadio
family remains in limbo: The Kouadios won the diversity visa lottery
 in
2019 after applying from their home in Ivory Coast. "But just before
their visa interviews, Donald Trump implemented an immigration ban that
runs through 31 March. If the president doesn't step in, Kouadio's
family will lose their visas." Stef W. Kight at Axios
 further
breaks down how diversity visa lottery winners are losing their
chance to immigrate.  

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**A BIBLICAL PRINCIPLE** - In an op-ed for The Baptist Standard
 calling
for passage of the Dream Act
, advocate
Brenda Kirk explains how the Bible "makes abundantly clear God loves
immigrants and commands his people to love and seek justice for
them." When it comes to Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)
recipients and other Dreamers brought to the U.S. as children, Kirk
writes that "there is a biblical principle at play here. We should not
punish children for the offenses of their parents." She concludes: "One
way we can demonstrate love to immigrant children is by urging our
elected officials finally to pass the Dream Act to allow vulnerable
immigrants to move forward with productive lives. Doing so also will
restore immigrants' faith in God and country." 

**TAXES **- In an op-ed for Accounting Today
, Tabassum
Ali explains how, as we look to post-pandemic economic
recovery, "[l]egalizing 11 million undocumented immigrants would not
only improve quality of life for those families living in the dark, but
also benefit states seeking additional revenues to fund projects that
help millions of average Americans." As states face "considerable
uncertainty regarding their budget outlook" into 2022, Ali
writes, legalizing undocumented immigrants may help foster tax
collection at the local and state levels. According to a report
 from The Institute on Taxation and
Economic Policy, granting legal status to all undocumented immigrants
"would boost their current state and local tax contributions by more
than $2.1 billion a year." (P.S. We recently wrote about how an
increase in immigration could benefit local tax bases and offset the
negative impacts of demographic change
.)

Thanks for reading,

Ali

 

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