Migrant Justice Newsletter - JUNE 2023

In this newsletter, please read about

1. Immigration Court in Cleveland, OH
2. ICE Air: Update on Removal Flight Trends
3. Cruelty at the Border Is Not Success
4. At the Border: Recent Incidents at and around the US-Mexico Border 
5. Halfway to the US: A Report on Migration from Honduras
6. Venezuelans: How US Sanctions Are Driving Migration North to the US 
7. Asylum in Limbo – a book review

TAKE ACTION NOW

Here is what you can do to take action this week and act in solidarity with migrants and their families. (See details at the bottom of this newsletter.)

A) Follow the Biden Deportations Tracker

B) Tell Senator Sherrod Brown to take his name off Sen. Kyrsten Sinema’s anti-asylum bill!

C) Urge Your Congressperson to Support the American Families United Act (AFUA)

D) Restoring Asylum and Dignity for Immigrants – webinar July 12, 7-8pm EDT

1- Immigration Court in Cleveland, OH

Ohio ranks #18 in filing deportation proceedings (out of 31 states that have immigration courts). 

Ohio ranks #17 in ordering deportations.

In May 2023,the United States stepped up its deportation efforts. In May, 145,878 new deportation proceedings were filed, bringing the total up to 788,548. This rise surpasses all prior months of the fiscal year 2023 by far. 

In Ohio, 3,489 new deportation proceedings were filed in May, bringing the total to  14,316 deportation proceedings filed this fiscal year. In May, Ohio ranks #18 in filing deportation proceedings.

New Deportation proceedings:

In April, 2,261 new deportation proceedings were filed in Cleveland

In May, 3,489 new deportation proceedings were filed in Cleveland.

That increase is partially due to this: 

New deportation proceedings against 1,278 migrants from Mauritania and 888 from Uzbekistan were filed in Ohio in May 2023.

Additionally new deportation proceedings against 1,278 migrants from Mauritania and 888 from Uzbekistan were filed in Ohio 

Cleveland EOIR - Deportations Ordered

(please see the chart below)

In Ohio, the immigration court ordered 530 new deportations in the month of May, five more than in April. The total number of individuals receiving a deportation order in Ohio now lies at 3,510 this fiscal year.

The total number of deportations ordered nationwide this fiscal year now is 152,313, an increase of 22,362 in one month. Nationwide Ohio, is #17 in deportations ordered. Topping the list in May 2023: Honduras, Mexico, Guatemala, Nicaragua. 

MINORS GIVEN DEPORTATION ORDERS

In the Juvenile Court Docket of Cleveland, 31 minors received deportation orders in May 2023. The total number of deportations ordered by the Juvenile Court has now reached 237 this fiscal year. This is made up of 132 Guatemalans (a rise of 17 compared to April), 85 Hondurans (12 more than in April), 9 Salvadorans, 6 Nicaraguans, 4 Mexicans (2 more than in April) and one Chilean minor.

MINORS ordered deported from Cleveland EOIR (juvenile docket) in recent months:

Ordered deported in May 2023:

31 Overall

17 Guatemalan minors

12 Honduran minors

2 Salvadoran minors

3 Nicaraguan minors

Current fiscal year - minors ordered deported from Cleveland (since OCT 2022)

206 Overall

115 Guatemalan

73 Honduran

9 Salvadoran

6 Nicaraguan

2  Mexican

1 Chilean 

MINORS ordered deported from Cleveland EOIR (juvenile docket) each month of FY 2023:

30: OCT 2022

27: NOV 2022 

37: DEC 2022 

27: JAN 2023 

47: FEB - MAR 2023

38: APR 2023 

31: MAY 2023

Source: TRAC at Syracuse University (Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse)

2- ICE Air: Update on Removal Flight Trends

The U.S. government’s COVID-19 public health emergency order expired on May 11, 2023 — this includes the Title 42 order that has expelled over 2.5 million migrants from the US-Mexico border.  The Biden Administration is now rolling out plans that would continue to restrict many migrants’ access to asylum, including a “transit ban” and ultra-rapid adjudication of asylum cases under conditions of expedited removal. 

Since President Biden’s inauguration there have been 17,293  likely ICE air flights, including 2,985 removal flights.

ICE Air Flights: 138,500 deported/expelled over past year

The number of observed removal flights to ten different countries in Latin America and the Caribbean continues to rise. Over the last 12 months, there have been 8,226 ICE Air flights; 1,385 of those have been removal flights.  With an estimated average of 100 passengers per flight, this means that over the past 12 months, as many as 138,500 people could have been returned to Latin America, the Caribbean and a small number to Africa by air by the U.S.

With the end of Title 42, there is a transition from T42 expulsion flights to Title 8 deportation flights. With this transition in mid-May, there was a lull in removal flights before the T8 expedited removal deportations ramp up.

Removal Flights, Lateral Flights, Domestic Shuffles:

In May 2023, there were 709 ICE Air flights, utilizing 30 different planes operated by 5 different charter carriers (IAero, World Atlantic, GlobalX, Eastern, and Gryphon). 

Shuffle flights: 436

Shuffle flights decreased from 440 in April to 436 in May. Shuffle flights are domestic flights transporting migrants from either from one processing center along the border to another, or from one detention center to another.  Shuffle flights include the lateral flights, listed below. 

Lateral flights: 44

Lateral flights decreased from 55 (April) to 44 (May), due to a decrease in flights from El Paso of 60 from 77 in April to 17 in May. In addition to the 17 from El Paso, there were 11 from Harlingen, 6 from Yuma, 6 from San Diego, and 4 from Tucson. Lateral flights are from border city to border city. Migrants are flown from one border city to another for processing, which leads to expulsion for at least half of them. There are also buses doing the same thing, but no data is available on the buses. 

Removal flights: 107. Increased flights to El Salvador, Honduras. Decreased flights to Colombia, Guatemala, Ecuador.

Removal flights decreased from 117 (April) to 106 (May). There were still increases in removal flights to Honduras (up from 17 to 26), and El Salvador (up from 4 to 8). Ecuador saw a decrease from 20 to 10, Guatemala decreased from 33 to 26, and Colombia decreased from 21 to 17. 

Removal flights are a mix of migrants being sent back to their home countries under Title 42 (“expulsions”), Title 8 (“inadmissables”),  and deportations. Countries accepting T42 flights as of May 11: Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, and Peru.

Guatemala – 22% decrease

ICE Air flights to Guatemala decreased by 7 from 33 to 26, as a result of a pause in flights from May 11 to May 17. The 26 flights in May compares to the prior 6-month average of 30 and to May 2022 at 32.

With the 1 Mexican government deportation flight to Guatemala added to the ICE flights, Guatemala received 27 flights, returning 3,340 citizens by air from the US and Mexico. Combined with the estimated 660 Guatemalans returned by land by Mexico at Tecún Únam an estimated 4,000 Guatemalans returned by the US and Mexico, 6,6016 less than in March, a significant drop, and 1,465 less than April.

Honduras – 35% increase

Flights to Honduras increased by 9 from 17 in April to 26 in May, impacted by Santa Semana (Holy Week) because, unlike Guatemala, flights were not paused.  

The total number of people returned in May by air to Guatemala and Honduras is estimated at 6,080.

Ecuador – 30% decrease

Ice Air Flights to Ecuador decreased by 10 from 20 (April) to 10 (May). Removal flights to Ecuador were impacted by the transition to T8 as 8 of the 10 flights were before 12 May, which could indicate fewer Ecuadorans were staged in detention centers for deportations than Guatemalans and Hondurans, whose flights were not as impacted by the change from expulsions to deportations.

Colombia

In May 2023, ICE Air Flights to Colombia decreased by 4.

El Salvador

Flights to El Salvador increased from 4 (April) to 8 (May).

Special Note: There has long been uncertainty as to whether El Salvador accepted returns of those subject to T42. According to a court declaration in November, El Salvador DOES NOT accept T42 flights, which means these are all T8 returns, some of which could be expedited.

Other destinations

Dominican Republic

Flights decreased by 2 from the 3-year high of 7 (April) to 5 (May). 

Peru:

Dropped by 2 from an over 3-year high of 8 (April) to 6 (May).

Haiti

Experienced 1 flight of 86 people. 

Brazil

Flights remained at 1 in May.

Cuba

Experienced the first return flight since December 2020 on April 24. But there were no flights in May.

Small Jet Removals

Observations included two flights on a Gryphon Air Gulfstream that carries 12-15 passengers as a maximum. Deportations on this route included Israel and Angola.

Other destinations for ICE Air flights this month were:

Nicaragua (2)

Jamaica (1)

Sources: Witness At the Border, WOLA

3- Cruelty at the Border Is Not Success

The Asylum Process Has Been Decimated

After Title 42, the Biden Administration has enacted a series of rules that systematically destroy people's ability to seek asylum. The asylum rules require applicants to: 1) apply for asylum in a third country and be denied; or 2) use the convoluted, barely functional CBP One App to schedule an asylum appointment. If you are deported, you now face a 5-year entry ban and could be prosecuted with a felony if caught reentering. In just a week since the end of Title 42, the U.S. deported 11,000 people. 

Migrants are Trapped on the Migratory Route

The migrants trying to enter the US are trapped in different parts of the migratory route. Shelters in Mexico are past capacity and families and children are living in terrible conditions, leaving people susceptible to violence from crime groups and human rights abuses.

Source: Quixote Center

4- Halfway to the US: A Report from Honduras on Migration

WOLA is doing a series of stories on what’s happening at key stages of the migration route. During an investigative trip to Honduras (Apr 26-May 5), they found that Honduras, like its neighbors, now experiences four kinds of migration: (1) Hondurans who are departing, (2) Hondurans who are internally displaced, (3) Hondurans deported back from other countries, and (4) international migrants transiting the country.

Since the land route from South America opened up in 2021 (Darién Gap), the numbers of international migrants passing through Central America are up as well. Many of the U.S.-bound migrants are coming from other continents. Honduras serves as place of respite, for migrants to catch their breath after journeying through the dangerous Darién Gap and before the make the rough trip to the Guatemala-Mexico border. Honduras is neither deporting nor detaining most migrants, and it has waived a fine that it had been charging for travel documents required to board buses. That fine had left many migrants in Honduras stranded, while providing corrupt authorities with an opportunity for extortion. Upon entry, most migrants now register directly with the government without the need to pay a fee. This reduces opportunities for organized crime. It also makes transiting the country slightly more bearable and provides a more accurate registry of those who enter the country. WOLA calls this “amnesty” a necessary alignment with reality and that other countries would do well to emulate what Honduras is doing.

But migrants coming from the south and moving through Honduras to head north is only part of the picture. The United States and Mexico deport 1,500-2,000 Honduran migrants in a typical week. Deported migrants share alarming testimonies about the treatment they receive while in the custody of, and being transported by, U.S. law enforcement agencies. These rarely end up with investigations or discipline because pathways to reporting are often unclear or inaccessible, especially when witnesses are deported. Attention to deported migrants as they arrive in Honduras is supported by the U.S. government, indirectly through international organizations and humanitarian groups. Conditions appear relatively dignified and well resourced, but assistance with reintegration largely stops at the doors of the reception centers. Security risks are high, and economic and psychosocial needs are the most urgent.

What is needed to address migration

• Migration through Honduras and northward to the US is part of an international pattern of migration. Migrants (displaced persons, people escaping violence or severe economic distress exacerbated by climate shocks) are coming from multiple continents to South and Central America. Some choose to migrate through Mexico to the US. This new reality calls for consistent and reliable international funding to treat this as the severe humanitarian crisis that it is. And to address the conditions that force people to emigrate (poverty, violence, impunity, corruption, persecution, climate change, domestic violence, and a general sense of “rootlessness”), we need community-based and institutional reforms.

Source

https://www.wola.org/analysis/halfway-to-us-report-honduras-migration/

5- At the Border: Recent Incidents at and around the US-Mexico Border 

This is a space where we share current incidents from the US southern border to show that these issues that we write about do, in fact, immediately affect people at the border and in detention, and the horrible things many migrants have to experience while seeking refuge in the U.S. 

May 18 -  While apparently unarmed, Border Patrol shot 58-year-old Raymond Mattia multiple times in the front yard of his house in the Tohono O’Odham Nation Reservation in Arizona. His sister Annette Mattia told Arizona Public Media that Raymond’s body remained in his front yard for seven hours until the medical examiner arrived. “We just got to say our goodbyes in a bodybag,” she said. Family and friends have held protests outside of Tucson Sector Border Patrol headquarters and the Ajo Border Patrol station and are pushing for accountability.

May 26 - DHS is telling migrants they have to use the CBP One app to schedule appointments at a land port-of-entry, but half of migrants surveyed  by the media outlet Axios report they’ve been unable to access the app or otherwise unable to schedule using the app. So migrants are lining up the old-fashioned way. CBP, in response, is only allowing a small number of in-person on-the-spot appointments per day. This practice, known as “metering,” was ruled illegal by a federal district court ruled in 2020.  

June 1 – CBP issued a statement about the death of 8-year-old Anadith Tanay Reyes Álvarez, who was detained at the Harlingen (TX) Border Patrol Station. Between the time Ana’s  family arrived at Harlingen Station on the evening of May 14 and the early morning hours of May 17, CBP contracted medical personnel reported having approximately nine encounters with the girl and her mother, who complained of fever (which peaked at 104.9), flu-like symptoms, and pain. During the day on May 17, Ana was seen by a nurse practitioner on four occasions after complaining of a stomachache, nausea, and difficulty breathing.  The nurse practitioner reported denying three or four requests from the girl’s mother for an ambulance to be called or for her to be taken to the hospital. When Ana had an apparent seizure at 2pm and was unresponsive, EMS was called and transported her to Valley Baptist Hospital where she was declared dead. CBP reports that Contracted medical personnel did not consult with on-call physicians (including an on-call pediatrician) about the girl’s condition, symptoms, or treatment. The contracted medical personnel also failed to document numerous medical encounters, emergency antipyretic interventions, and administrations of medicine. Ana’s parents had provided to Border Patrol documents showing their daughter’s heart condition and sickle cell anemia.

SOURCES

https://www.wola.org/2023/06/weekly-u-s-mexico-border-update-migration-lull-ends-lines-at-ports-of-entry-arizona-border-patrol-shooting/

https://www.axios.com/2023/05/26/border-mexico-us-immigration-policy

https://cgrs.uchastings.edu/our-work/al-otro-lado-v-mayorkas

https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/speeches-and-statements/update-death-custody-8-year-old-harlingen-texas-0

Want to find out more about the conditions at the southern US border? Sign up for the weekly Border Update from WOLA. https://www.wola.org/tag/weekly-border-update/ 

6- Venezuelans: How US Sanctions Are Driving Migration North to the US 

In the Cleveland immigration court in May 2023, nationals of Venezuela ranked #1 of all new deportation cases filed by the Department of Homeland Security against Latin Americans.  Since the beginning of Fiscal Year 2022, the number of Venezuelans who are issued notices to appear in immigration court have rivaled those of nationalities more accustomed to being at the top of the list (e.g., Guatemalans, Hondurans, Mexicans).  So what is driving so many Venezuelans to Ohio?

The US White House.

Venezuela has been the victim of US sanctions for years. Following the election of President Hugo Chávez in 1998 and a failed US backed coup in 2002, US policies against South America’s fifth most populous nation have been getting more and more devastating. Sanctions prohibiting arms trading with Venezuela were established by the George W. Bush administration and aggravated by President Obama. But this was just a mild beginning. After Trump took power in 2017, he established a “maximum pressure” policy towards Venezuela, banning any exports to the country while also blocking Venezuela from selling its number one export product, oil, to the United States and its allies. 

In the same time period, opposition politician Juan Guaidó took up efforts to take over power in Venezuela by force. This movement trying to overthrow the elected president Nicolás Maduro was strongly backed by the United States, likely as a means of securing the Venezuelan vast natural oil resources of the country by establishing a friendly government. The climax of this attempt was the 2018 election in which Maduro was elected as president for an additional term, which the Venezuelan opposition and the US did not recognize. In the aftermath of the election, opposition politician Juan Guaidó declared himself the official president of the country despite not being elected by the Venezuelan people. Within minutes of him swearing in as president in January 2019, the US, European Union and their allies declared their solidarity with Guaidó and recognized him as the rightful president of Venezuela. After this attempt of taking over the government failed, Guaidó turned against his own people by calling for an expansion of the sanctions against Venezuela and an overthrow of the Maduro government. And he got what he wanted. The Trump administration began pushing efforts to make regional governments recognize Guaidó as president as well as exacerbating the sanctions, tightening the noose around the neck of the Venezuelan people and bringing more suffering and hunger over “his” people. For almost four years, Guaidó was admired by the West for his support of the US’s efforts to overthrow the Maduro government. 

But what came out of all of this? Following the Trump election, the prior sanctions targeting arms sales and high ranking Venezuelan political figures were extended to hit the country as a whole. The US established broad financial and trade sanctions in conjunction with an oil embargo, making it next to impossible for Venezuela to sell its most valuable resource, which made up the majority of its budget. In addition to this devastating blow to Venezuela’s ability to finance itself through trade, the US, UK and their partners froze billions in state assets abroad and handed access to hundreds of millions of dollars in US bank accounts and the US-based Venezuelan subsidiary oil company Citgo  over to the Venezuelan opposition, which used them in their campaigns against Maduro. Furthermore, the “maximum pressure” policy is used to keep Venezuela off of international markets, preventing necessary imports like medications. This devastating strategy aims to create mass suffering to cause an uprising and the overthrowing of the government. 

Before taking office,  Biden declared an interest in reviewing the policy but kept it largely unchanged. Following the outbreak of the Ukraine war, the US sent a delegation to Venezuela in an effort to ensure support of Ukraine with very little results. Until now, Biden has kept Trump’s sanctions firmly in place, causing ongoing suffering and migration.       

In December of 2022, the Venezuelan opposition ended its support of Juan Guaidó and dismissed his role as “acting president,” leading the US to block any access to Venezuelan financial assets before handing them back to the opposition in 2023. 

International studies have shown that the “maximum pressure” policy has harmed Venezuelan society in many ways. Economist Francisco Rodríguez stated that the “sanctions have negative effects on outcomes ranging from per-capita income to poverty, inequality, morality and human rights.” An effort to secure living standards by raising the minimum wage failed and drove mass inflation. The sanctions, mixed with inflation, have resulted in a mass exodus from Venezuela to neighboring countries and the US.

The only way to end this mass suffering and migration is an end to the sanctions, which a group of 21 US congressional Democrats have called for. As a first step, members of the Venezuelan government and opposition met for talks in Mexico, establishing a common agenda and a framework for the constitutionally mandated presidential elections in 2024. The talks also led to the establishment of a $3.2 billion fund administered by the UN and drawn from frozen Venezuelan assets abroad. The fund is designed to meet urgent social needs like the repair of infrastructure, schools and hospitals. But still, reaching an end to the sanctions and suffering will be an uphill battle in the run up to the 2024 election in the US. Easing sanctions could make Biden appear as sympathetic to Venezuela’s left-wing president Nicolás Maduro.

For IRTF it is clear that the suffering and mass migration of the Venezuelan people will not end before the harmful sanctions are lifted and Venezuela is able to rebuild its infrastructure, financial, and social sectors.  In our eyes it is essential that we as human rights activists educate US society on the harm the sanctions do and build awareness and a movement to oppose them.       

Sources: 

https://cepr.net/cepr-sanctions-watch-may-2023/#Venezuela

https://truthout.org/articles/sanctions-on-venezuela-arent-promoting-democracy-theyre-killing-venezuelans/

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/venezuela-sees-oil-exports-financing-almost-two-thirds-2023-budget-2022-12-05/

https://jacobin.com/2023/05/us-sanctions-migration-cuba-venezuela-mexico-border?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=3baf833c-8501-4468-aa4f-8466a27ffadf

7- Asylum in Limbo – a book review

Asylum in Limbo, by Andrea R. Flores, a Washington, D.C.-based policy expert and lawyer who has served as an immigration policy advisor at the Department of Homeland Security, the White House, and the US Senate. (May 2023)

“Nationalist movements rely on immigration systems that minimize the number of nonwhite immigrants they welcome.”  @Arosaflores

The US asylum process at the border was essentially shut down after Trump issued the public health order Title 42 in March 2020. Over the next three years, the US would conduct approximately 2.8 million expulsions of migrants, regardless of their reasons for trying to enter the country. In her new book Asylum in Limbo, Andrea Flores argues that when Title 42 finally expired on May 11, 2023, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) should have promptly returned to processing migrants under existing immigration laws, which allow people who enter without authorization to seek asylum if they successfully demonstrate a credible fear of persecution or torture.

But the president who campaigned to end Title 42 did something else.  On May 11, President Biden implemented his own ban on asylum seekers at the US–Mexico border. Bearing a striking resemblance to a similar asylum ban issued by President Trump in 2019, nearly all migrants who fail to seek asylum in another country first or secure an appointment to enter at a land port of entry will be presumed ineligible for asylum when they reach US territory. This blocks most would-be asylum seekers at the southern border from making asylum claims. The rule effectively normalizes the dangerous theory that, because certain migrants are at once less deserving of humanitarian protection than others and more threatening to the social cohesion of our democracy, the US can dispense with its legal obligations under the Refugee Act of 1980 to individually review every asylum case.

Says Flores: “We have seen in the past three years how easily racial preferences can be used to decide who we allow to seek refuge—even if it means designing new legal pathways for them—and who we turn away.”

Source

https://www.nybooks.com/online/2023/05/28/asylum-in-limbo/

--------------------------------------------

TAKE ACTION NOW

Now that you are up to date on the issues at and around the southern border of the U.S., here is what you can do to take action this week and act in solidarity with migrants and their families.

A) Biden Deportations Tracker

Migrant justice advocates are tracking the number of people President Biden has deported and expelled from the country during his time in office.  See the re-launched tracker at our BidenStopDeportations.com page with an updated count: over 4 million people.

People always have and always will migrate. No matter the reason, everyone should be able to move freely and without fear of criminalization, deportation, and family separation. 

Share and uplift our latest posts on social media!

Share on Facebook // RT on Twitter //  Repost on IG 

Post the Deportation Tracker on your own pages by using the social samples below and graphics here

B) Tell Senator Sherrod Brown to take his name off Sen. Kyrsten Sinema’s anti-asylum bill!

Note to Ohio residents: Senator Brown has signed onto another anti-immigrant/ anti-asylum bill in the US Senate (S 1473) put forth by Senator Kyrsten Sinema of AZ and Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina.  Read Senator Sinema’s statement about this proposed legislation here. This bill would effectively end the legal right to asylum, create a new detention and expulsion regime, require mandatory detention of children and families, and would also further militarize border communities. Contact Senator Sherrod Brown and express your opposition to this anti-asylum bill! Click here to send a message to Senator Brown. 

C) Urge Your Congressperson to Support the Dignity Act 2023 (HR 3599)

The American Families United Act Coalition announced (June 28 2023) that H.R. 1698, introduced by Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-Texas) on March 22, 2023 and co-sponsored by Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar (R-Florida),  has been added in its entirety to H.R. 3599, The Dignity Act of 2023, a comprehensive bipartisan bill that was introduced May 23 by Rep. Salazar (R-FL-27). The legislation would provide protection from deportation and a pathway to a green card for some members of mixed-status families living in the United States. The bill is designed so that the U.S. Attorney General and the Department of Homeland Security have discretion to allow certain individuals to remain with their families stateside. 

This bill is to protect families from having to go through the heartbreaking challenge of having family members deported after being unable to complete the process for lawful permanent residence. This bill would also help families that are unable to sponsor their spouses and children for green cards. 

The bill needs more co-sponsors. So far there are just over ten, from California, Florida, Michigan, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico and Texas. Click here to find your US representative (congressperson). Ask them to sign on as a co-sponsor of HR 3599.

https://immigrationforum.org/article/bill-summary-american-families-united-act/ 

https://www.fwd.us/news/american-families-united-act/ 

https://www.congress.gov/bill/118th-congress/house-bill/3599/text?s=1&r=1&q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22hr+3599%22%5D%7D

D) Restoring Asylum and Dignity for Immigrants – webinar July 12, 7-8pm EDT

Immigration partners from Lawyers for Good Government at the Matamoras-Brownsville border and Kino Border Initiative from the Nogales, Arizona-Mexico border will share the day-to-day realities of working for justice at the southern border, and tell us what is needed to support immigration services across the U.S.

Register for this free webinar here: https://www.mobilize.us/network/event/569129/ .