The Trump administration plans to send Mexican asylum seekers to Guatemala

According to documents sent to U.S. asylum officers in recent days, Mexicans seeking asylum in the United States could be sent to Guatemala under a bilateral agreement signed between the U.S. and the Central American country in 2019 .

On January 4, field office staff at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services ( USCIS ) were told Mexican nationals will be included in the populations “amenable” to the agreement with Guatemala .

The agreement signed by the Trump administration and Guatemala allows U.S. immigration officials to send asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexican border to apply for protection in Guatemala instead.

Mexico

objects to the plan, its Foreign Ministry said in a statement released on January 6, adding that it would be working with authorities to find “better options” for those that could be affected.

Trump

has made clamping down on unlawful migration a top priority of his presidency and a major theme of his 2020 re-election campaign. His administration penned similar deals with Honduras and El Salvador in 2019 .

U.S. Democrats and pro-migrant groups have opposed the move and contend asylum seekers will face danger in Guatemala , where the murder rate is five times that of the United States, according to 2017 data compiled by the World Bank. The country’s asylum office is tiny and thinly staffed and critics have argued it lacks the capacity to properly vet a significant increase in cases.

Guatemalan President

- elect Alejandro Giammattei , who takes office this month, has said he will review the agreement.

Acting Deputy U.S. Department of Homeland Security ( DHS ) Secretary Ken Cuccinelli said in a tweet in December that Mexicans were being considered for inclusion under the agreement.

USCIS

referred questions to DHS , which referred to Cuccinelli’s tweet .

Alejandra Mena,

a spokeswoman for Guatemala’s Immigration Institute , said that since the agreement was implemented in November, the United States has sent 52 migrants to the country. Only six have applied for asylum in Guatemala , Mena said.

On Monday, 33 Central American migrants arrived on a flight to Guatemala City, she said.

Unaccompanied minors

cannot be sent to Guatemala under the agreement, which now applies only to migrants from Honduras , El Salvado r, and Mexico , according to the guidance documents. Exceptions are made if the migrants can establish that they are “more likely than not” to be persecuted or tortured in Guatemala based on their race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.

In recent months, with fewer Central Americans at the border, the U.S. has turned its attention to Mexicans crossing illegally or requesting asylum . About 150,000 Mexican single adults were apprehended at the border in fiscal 2019.

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