New migration patterns across Panama’s treacherous Darién Gap and the expected end of the United States’ Title 42 expulsions policy could spell months of heightened migration from diverse sources into North America.

The 66-mile remote tangle of jungle separating Colombia from Panama has become increasingly well-trodden for migrants leaving South America. Last year, nearly 134,000 people passed through the Darién according to Panamanian border authorities, a more than 15-fold increase over 2020 and well more than the 109,000 who crossed during the entire decade from 2010 through 2019.

Numbers are up again in 2022 compared to the first two months of last year, but it is hard to make a direct comparison since most crossings of the Darién occurred later in 2021, after COVID-19-related border closures eased. Overall trends may in fact represent a leveling off after a remarkable period of unbottling in 2021, when would-be migrants constrained by months of restrictions were finally able to move.  

Regardless, the composition of migrants is changing, potentially due to persistent economic impacts of the pandemic. In January and February, about 2,500 Venezuelans crossed the Darién, nearly as many as in all of 2021. According to United Nations agencies, an increasing number are coming directly from Venezuela, rather than moving on from other countries in South America.

As Caitlyn Yates described in the Migration Information Source last year, more than half those traversing the jungle in 2021 were Haitians, many of whom had previously lived in Brazil and Chile until economic and other conditions turned.

Continued passage could have ripple effects farther north, especially after May 23, when the United States lifts the controversial pandemic-era Title 42 policy, which allows it to immediately expel migrants at the southwest border. In this week’s U.S. Policy Beat article, Migration Policy Institute experts Muzaffar Chishti and Jessica Bolter describe the challenges in unwinding the policy, under which 1.7 million expulsions occurred between March 2020 and February 2022.

Approximately 40 percent of migrants recently encountered under the policy are reportedly from countries outside from the traditional origins of Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, complicating return efforts. Yet as Muzaffar and Jessica describe, Mexico in recent months tightened its policies by imposing visa requirements on some South American nationals, which may hamper onward movement to the United States. Perhaps as a result, in January and February, more than 16,000 people filed asylum claims in Mexico—an increase over the same period in 2021 and 2020.

The Biden administration is reportedly bracing for a “mass migration event” once the expulsions policy is lifted, with increased pressure on both the United States and Mexico. Last summer the two countries confronted rising arrivals. Whatever the post-Title 42 landscape looks like, increased unauthorized migration seems inevitable.

Best regards,
Julian Hattem
Editor, Migration Information Source
[email protected]