The Biden administration continues to grapple with the growing number of migrants, including unaccompanied children, seeking refuge at the border. This week, it opened more shelters and changed policies to fast-track the release of children amid growing scrutiny following the release of photos showing children living in cramped conditions at a border facility in Donna, Texas.

There’s a lot going on, and the situation is changing rapidly. Here’s a roundup of the past week’s biggest developments:

The increase in border crossings fits with the usual seasonal patterns. A new analysis of U.S. Customs and Border Protection monthly data dating back to 2012 concludes that what’s happening at the border can’t be directly attributed to Biden administration policies, a popular talking point of many Republican lawmakers. “Rather, the current increase in apprehensions fits a predictable pattern of seasonal changes in undocumented immigration combined with a backlog of demand because of 2020’s coronavirus border closure,” according to the analysis by the University of California, San Diego’s U.S. Immigration Policy Center. The data shows that border arrivals typically escalate early in the year, following the winter months. And while the number of apprehensions in February was higher than in the same month in previous years, researchers found that this is likely due to the pandemic, when “movement dropped dramatically.” COVID-19 delayed migrants from making the journey to the border, and they’re arriving now. “This year looks like the usual seasonal increase plus migrants who would have come last year, but could not.”

The administration is scrambling to open new locations to house unaccompanied children. As of this week, about 5,000 migrant children are being held in border facilities that are not meant to keep them for long periods of time. And because the U.S. shelter system for migrant children is already overwhelmed, the government is now looking to open at least six emergency locations, CBS News reports. These “influx” shelters, which can house thousands of children at a time, aren’t monitored by state agencies for child care violations the way that the typical shelters are. An arena in San Antonio and convention centers in San Diego and Dallas, where 1,500 teens are already being held, are being used as temporary shelters. The Department of Defense has also received a request to keep children at military bases in San Antonio and El Paso, Texas. Meanwhile, the Office of Refugee Resettlement, which oversees the network of regular shelters for migrant children, has issued new guidelines directing shelters to fast-track the release of children who have parents or legal guardians already in the U.S. 

Biden keeps Trump’s immigration ban at the border for now. Last March, the Trump administration invoked a ban, under Title 42 of the U.S. Code, to turn back migrants at the border during the pandemic. In a story this week, the Los Angeles Times documents the toll of this policy: “Of more than 650,000 encounters with migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border, fewer than 1% have been able to seek protection.” Although the policy no longer applies to unaccompanied children, it is still being used to turn away migrant adults and families. After taking office, President Joe Biden ordered the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Homeland Security to review the ban. But the administration has “largely sidestepped questions of a timeline or any metrics for lifting Title 42 and reopening U.S. borders.” For now, Biden’s message to migrants is clear. “Don't come over," he told ABC News last week. “Don't leave your town or city or community.”

Fact-based journalism is worth fighting for.

3 THINGS WE’RE READING

1. Despite the headlines, local officials and residents at the border say their communities are facing “little overall impact.” (The Washington Post)

Some Republican lawmakers say the Biden administration has opened the U.S. border to all migrants, wreaking havoc along border cities. But community members say that’s not the case. They expressed frustration that the border is once again being politicized even as these communities face other daunting issues, like a recent winter freeze and the toll of the pandemic.  

The kicker: Residents and border city leaders say they often don’t feel heard about the practical steps needed to avert an actual crisis. Few want open borders here, but they say that’s not what is happening right now. “Some people come with good intentions, and some come for a photo op,” said Richard Cortez, the Hidalgo County judge. “But for all the agendas, we still haven’t been able to solve this problem,” the Democrat said. “How can we tell the rest of America to wake up and tell your congressional people that what we want – no, need – is comprehensive immigration reform.” 

2. Smuggling groups are lying to migrants about their chances of being allowed into the U.S. (Los Angeles Times) 

Since Biden won the election, human smugglers have been selling false promises to migrants eager to make their case for U.S. asylum. 

The kicker: As dusk closed in on the Texas border with Mexico, Melania Rivera and her 3-year-old twin boys climbed up the banks of the Rio Grande, at last setting foot in the United States. Her former partner and their two older children had been in the U.S. since 2019, waiting for their asylum cases to be heard. Rivera, whose home in Honduras was destroyed by a hurricane in November, set out to join them after a relative in Virginia urged her to come quickly, saying border restrictions had relaxed under President Biden. “He told me there was an opportunity,” said Rivera, 42, who was intercepted south of the city of Mission with seven other migrants by local police working with the Border Patrol. The belief that the end of the Trump administration has opened the border has spread throughout the region alongside another rumor: Young children are the ticket in. 

3. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has no plan to vaccinate detained immigrants.  (The Washington Post) 

As the Biden administration says it wants every eligible adult to be inoculated by May, “lawyers for immigrants who are detained say there is no urgency to vaccinate those in federal custody against a deadly pathogen that can spread fast in confined spaces.”

The kicker: Unlike ICE, the Bureau of Prisons has a program to vaccinate federal inmates imprisoned for criminal cases, and vaccine doses are shipped directly from manufacturers to the prisons. Since staffers come and go, they get the shots first, followed by prisoners. Approximately 14,700 of the 152,000 inmates have gotten the injections so far – a small but growing share that the BOP updates each weekday online. No similar system exists at ICE, and a Business Insider investigation last month found that the agency had no vaccination plan.
 

NEWS BREAK: REMEMBERING SELENA

As we approach what would have been singer Selena Quintanilla’s 50th birthday, Texas Monthly reporter Cat Cardenas reflects on growing up in the shadow of the Queen of Tejano music. And as Selena’s legacy dazzles new audiences, Cardenas writes, “To truly understand what was lost when Selena died, new generations of fans need to see her as a person, not a myth.” 

From Texas Monthly:

In the days following my grandpa’s death in 2019, I searched his house for old photographs. My family was putting together a slideshow to play at his funeral, and I wanted to find pictures that would remind attendees of the incredible life he had lived: snapshots of him posing with the lions and hippos he cared for at the San Antonio Zoo, training polo ponies in Tennessee, and relaxing at his parents’ home back in Mexico.  

In an old dresser at the back of the house, I stumbled upon a worn leather book filled with photos, a handful of which fell to the floor when I opened it up, the adhesive long since dried out. I found myself gazing at images of two family dogs, Chaquira and Spudsie, that were long gone and of my cousins riding horseback at my grandpa’s ranch.

And then, toward the back of the album, I came across clippings from People and the San Antonio Express-News, all of them featuring Selena, all dated from the days and weeks after her death. In practically every shot she had a microphone in hand, and her dazzling smile lit up the page. “Thousands of fans mourn Selena,” read one headline. “Tejano artist’s potential to remain unrealized,” read another. 

Drowning in waves of despair over my grandpa’s death, I was desperate for a distraction. So I sat there at his kitchen table and pored over those stories. I recognized the grief in the faces of young fans sobbing by the chain-link fence that surrounded Selena’s Corpus Christi home and clutching the black marble bench at her grave site. 

Studying these images of mourning felt strangely comforting. My grandpa’s death was a loss so profound that I wasn’t sure I would ever recover. But those forgotten articles, by then more than two decades old, made clear to me that there is life after death and power in remembering. And for what felt like the thousandth time, Selena had found me right when I needed her. 

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– Laura C. Morel