Migration News Brief for October 15, 2024

Welcome to LAWG’s Migration News Brief, a compilation of recent top articles and reports related to issues of U.S. immigration and enforcement policy and migration from Central America and Mexico.

Spotlight

Statement on the Assassination of Honduran Environmental Leader Juan López, Signed By 20 Human Rights Organizations
Latin America Working Group, September 2024
“As faith-based and non-governmental human rights organizations with a long history working for human rights in Honduras, we strongly condemn the assassination of renowned environmental activist Juan López on Saturday, September 14 in Tocoa. An outspoken critic of open pit mining and hydroelectric projects, he was shot multiple times in his car after he left church.”

Act Now: Stand Against Violence in Chiapas!
Latin America Working Group, September 2024
“The violence terrorizing the people living in the Mexican state of Chiapas for the last three years has reached a dangerous crescendo. Citizens and civil society organizations on the ground are reporting a frightening rise in violence including assassinations, threats, extortions, destruction of property and displacement. A drone strike on a basketball court in the municipality of Chicomuselo, forced the entire town of 400 residents to flee. The level of violence is so extreme that approximately 600 people recently fled to Guatemala.”

US Enforcement

Biden administration won’t renew parole for immigrants from four countries
Maria Sacchett, The Washington Post, October 4, 2024
“The Biden administration said Friday that immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela who entered the United States through a parole program will have to leave the country once their two-year permits expire if they have not found another way to stay.”

Supreme Court takes new cases, including Mexican suit against U.S. gunmakers
Justin Jouvenal and Ann E. Marimow, The Washington Post, October 4, 2024
“Mexico wrote in its brief that approximately 350,000 to 600,000 guns made by the manufacturers are trafficked into Mexico each year and almost half of all guns recovered at crime scenes are from the U.S. companies. Mexico alleges most of those guns were originally bought by “straw purchasers” in the United States who sell them to smugglers or traffic them to the cartels.”

US farms are forcing workers to buy inedible, expensive meals: ‘It makes you feel enslaved’
Tina Vasquez, The Guardian, October 2, 2024
“The H-2A program is so rife with serious legal violations that attorney Caitlin Ryland with the farmworker unit of Legal Aid of North Carolina (Lanc) says forced meal plans are often overlooked – even as they become more common.”

Fighting Over Whether Haitian Immigrants Are ‘Legal’ Misses the Point: They’re Legally Vulnerable
Dara Lind, Immigration Impact, September 30, 2024
“The lives of recent arrivals from Haiti have been shaped by the interaction of several laws and policies, which combine to put them, right now, in a space that isn’t “illegal,” but isn’t fully, irrevocably “legal” either.” 

Biden shores up asylum limits, likely extending border crackdown indefinitely
Camilo Montoya-Galvez, CBS News, September 30, 2024
“President Biden’s administration on Monday announced new regulations to shore up the partial asylum ban it enacted at the U.S. southern border in June, likely extending the strict immigration policy indefinitely, through the presidential election and beyond.”

News comment: UNHCR reiterates concern about US asylum regulations
UNHCR, September 30, 2024
“UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, restates its profound concern as the U.S. government moves to make permanent its June 2024 asylum regulation. The regulation severely curtails access to protection for people fleeing conflict, persecution, and violence, putting many refugees and asylum seekers in grave danger without a viable option for seeking safety. ”

Mexican Enforcement

Mexico sends 660 soldiers, National Guard to protect lime growers suffering extortion by cartels
AP News, October 10, 2024
“The Defense Department said Thursday that since the start of President Claudia Sheinbaum’s administration on Oct. 1, it has sent 300 soldiers and 360 Guard officers to several lime-growing townships.”

Mexican soldiers kill six after opening fire on truck carrying migrants
Al Jazeera, October 3, 2024
“The Mexican military has revealed that soldiers opened fire this week on a truck carrying dozens of migrants, killing six people.”

Mexican soldiers arrested after migrant shooting leaves six dead
Lizbeth Diaz and Ana Isabel Martinez, Reuters, October 3, 2024
“Mexican authorities arrested soldiers who were part of a patrol that opened fire on a pickup truck killing six migrants, federal prosecutors said on Thursday, two days after the incident.”

6 migrants from Egypt, Peru and Honduras die near Guatemalan border after Mexican soldiers open fire
Mark Stevenson, AP News, October 3, 2024
“Mexican army troops opened fire on a truck carrying migrants from a half dozen countries, and six migrants from Egypt, Peru and Honduras died in an event that President Claudia Sheinbaum described Thursday as ‘deplorable.”

Root Causes

Mexico

A new mayor takes office in southern Mexico after his predecessor was beheaded
Alejandrino González, AP News, October 10, 2024
“A new mayor was sworn in Thursday in a city in southern Mexico where his predecessor was killed and beheaded less than a week after taking office.”

A Cartel Double-Cross Turns a Mexican State Into a War Zone
Natalie Kitroeff and Paulina Villegas, The New York Times, October 8, 2024
“An explosive deception has ripped apart one of Mexico’s most powerful criminal groups, the Sinaloa cartel, and ignited a war between the rival factions.”

El macabro asesinato del alcalde de Chilpancingo abre un nuevo frente en la crisis de violencia en México
Pablo Ferri, El País, 8 de octubre de 2024
“El caso de Alejandro Arcos es un ejemplo de la extrema violencia de las mafias regionales, ahora en Guerrero, vinculadas a la extorsión y la explotación de industrias legales, como el transporte público o los mercados”.

Diez años después de Ayotzinapa, la impunidad del gobierno mancha la búsqueda por la justicia
Omar Gómez Trejo, El Faro, 27 de septiembre de 2024
“Desde esa noche, he sido testigo de la inquebrantable esperanza, dignidad y determinación de las familias de los estudiantes. Su incansable búsqueda por verdad y justicia, junto con la creatividad y visión de sus abogados, ha mantenido la presión a nivel nacional e internacional sobre este caso. Sucesivos gobiernos se han comprometido a resolver el caso, pero con el tiempo cada uno lo ha dejado caer en saco roto”. 

Guatemala

Guatemala is stuck with a problematic attorney general, a legal study says
Sonia Perez D., AP News, October 8, 2024
“Guatemala’s Attorney General Consuelo Porras has been criticized and sanctioned by countries around the world for allegedly obstructing corruption investigations and using her power to persecute political opponents, but the country is effectively stuck with her, according to a legal analysis published Tuesday.”

Así se eligió la CSJ: ganadores, perdedores, alianzas inéditas y traiciones
Jody García, Plaza Pública, 7 de Octubre de 2024
“La integración de la nueva Corte Suprema de Justicia despertó reacciones encontradas, unas de preocupación sobre el deterioro democrático en Guatemala y otras que ven esperanzas de contar con autoridades judiciales que no responden por completo al conocido Pacto de Corruptos”. 

Guatemala Dismantles Major Migrant Trafficking Ring Involving Police
AFP, The Tico Times, October 1, 2024
“Guatemalan authorities dismantled a migrant trafficking network destined for the United States on Tuesday, which included police officers, according to Interior Minister Francisco Jiménez. The minister detailed that 36 people were arrested, including 23 active police officers and two retired ones.”

Washington Targeted ‘Corrupt’ Mines. Workers Paid The Greatest Price.
Jeff Stein and Claudia Méndez Arriaza, The Washington Post, September 27, 2024
“The people of El Estor became collateral damage in a widening gyre of economic warfare waged by the U.S. government against foreign corporations, fueling an out-migration that ultimately cost some of them their lives.”

El Salvador

El Salvador faces scrutiny for ‘political’ trial of five environmental activists
Nina Lakhani, The Guardian, October 9, 2024
“Five environmental activists who helped secure a historic mining ban in El Salvador are facing life imprisonment for an alleged civil war-era crime, in a case that has been condemned by UN and legal experts as baseless and politically motivated.”

Denuncias ante el Tribunal de Ética Gubernamental aumentaron casi 42% en un año
Jessica García, El Diario de Hoy, 9 de octubre de 2024
“El Tribunal de Ética Gubernamental (TEG) registró un aumento en las denuncias contra servidores públicos en un año, según su informe de rendición de cuentas que hizo llegar a la Asamblea Legislativa recientemente”.

Corte remueve a jueces para colocar exfuncionarios del TSE que habilitaron reelección de Bukele
Gabriel Labrador y Gabriela Cáceres, El Faro, 7 de Octubre de 2024
“Dos exmagistrados del Tribunal Supremo Electoral (TSE) que inscribieron la candidatura inconstitucional de Nayib Bukele para las elecciones de 2024 han sido nombrados magistrados de cámaras en el Órgano Judicial.”

Honduras

¿Disminución de migrantes retornados será señal de menos migración de hondureños?
Kelly Ortez, Criterio, 9 de Octubre de 2024
“Según los datos presentados por el canciller Eduardo Enrique Reina, con base en la información de la embajada de Honduras en los Estados Unidos, entre octubre de 2023 y agosto de 2024 se registraron 133,684 hondureños retornados desde la frontera sur de Estados Unidos”.

Honduras y Guatemala firman acuerdo para abordar el problema de la basura en las costas de Omoa
La Tribuna, 9 de octubre de 2024
“Honduras y Guatemala han firmado un importante acuerdo de cooperación para enfrentar el problema de la basura que afecta las playas de Omoa, en el Caribe hondureño”.

La Policía de Honduras dispara a dos ambientalistas en las tierras garífunas de Nueva Armenia
Gessami Forner, El Salto, 7 de Octubre de 2024
“La Policía de Honduras ha disparado a dos ambientalistas en tierras garífunas de Nueva Armenia, dejándolos heridos. Los hechos han tenido lugar el domingo —hora local—  durante una recuperación de estas tierras que, según el derecho internacional, pertenecen a este pueblo ancestral, asentado en Honduras antes de que Honduras fuera un país”.

RD fortalece Relaciones bilaterales con Honduras 
El Caribe, 4 de octubre de 2024
“El gobierno de la República Dominicana, bajo la gestión del presidente Luis Abinader continúa fortaleciendo las relaciones bilaterales con el gobierno hondureño y su homóloga, Xiomara Castro de Zelaya, con el propósito de consolidar la diplomacia y los vínculos que unen a ambas naciones, según datos oficiales”.

‘Pure Greed’: A Legal System That Gives Corporations Special Rights Has Come for Honduras
Nicholas Kusnetz, Katie Surma, Inside Climate News, October 3, 2024
“Investor-state dispute settlement allows foreign investors to sue governments for billions of dollars. A new report alleges a wave of ISDS claims against Honduras are tied to “mafia-style” investments made under a post-coup government.” 

Regional

“Las Fuerzas Armadas saben la verdad y que no tienen futuro con Maduro”: Machado
El Espectador, 9 de octubre de 2024
“En entrevista con El Espectador, la líder venezolana reconoce que la oposición todavía no ha logrado todos sus objetivos, pero que se están “acercando”, pues Nicolás Maduro se encuentra cada día “más aislado”, interna y externamente”.

The world’s mayors want to change the conversation on migration
Ishaan Tharoor, The Washington Post, October 4, 2024
“Migration is the powder keg of our angry age. Disquiet over influxes of asylum seekers has animated nationalists and nativists on both sides of the Atlantic. An ascendant strain of right-wing politics in Western democracies is rooted in suspicion and resentment of migrants. Outside the West, from Tunisia to India and many countries in between, demagogic leaders grandstand over fears about foreign interlopers.”

Dominican Republic says will expel up up to 10,000 Haitian migrants a week
Al Jazeera, October 3, 2024
“The Dominican Republic says it plans to expel as many as 10,000 Haitian migrants per week, despite a longstanding call from the United Nations to end forced returns to Haiti amid a surge in gang violence there.”

Gender and LGBTQ+

México, lejos de cerrar la brecha de género en puestos directivos: solo 3% de las empresas tiene como líder a una mujer
Karina Suarez, El País, 8 de octubre de 2024
“La presencia de mujeres en puestos directivos y en los consejos de administración de las empresas mexicanas sigue en mínimos. Un análisis del Instituto Mexicano para la Competitividad (Imco) a 209 compañías listadas en la Bolsa Mexicana de Valores revela que este año los espacios ocupados por las mujeres en áreas de alto mando son escasos y van a la baja, respecto a la evaluación de 2023”.

It isn’t only Sheinbaum. Meet the women who run Mexico
Mary Beth Sheridan and Valentina Muñoz Castillo, The Washington Post, October 4, 2024
“The new president, Claudia Sheinbaum, will govern with a cabinet that is half female and a Congress evenly divided between men and women. Women head the Supreme Court and central bank and run top federal ministries.”

Climate

Tras el mortal ‘Helene’, llega ‘Milton’: sí, el cambio climático está cambiando la dinámica de los huracanes
Maria Monica Monsalves, El País, 9 de octubre de 2024
“Entender cómo cambia la dinámica de los huracanes ante el calentamiento global implica amarrar varias piezas. Por esto, según explicó Ben Clarke, investigador del Gratham Institute del Imperial Collegue London (Reino Unido), el equipo analizó índices y modelos para tres factores: los patrones de lluvia, el viento y la temperatura superficial del océano, último aspecto que es clave en darles gasolina a los huracanes”.

Mexico’s new president promises to resume fight against climate change
Teresa de Miguel, AP News, October 4, 2024
“In her first days as Mexico’s new president, Claudia Sheinbaum made a point of distancing herself from the fossil fuel reliance promoted by her predecessor and mentor, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and vowed to resume an energy transition that he halted.”

Engaging Local Communities for More Effective Climate Mobility Programming
Lawrence Huang and Camille Le Coz, Migration Policy Institute, October 2024
“Empowering local actors to take leading roles in climate mobility programming can help ensure these solutions reflect communities’ needs and priorities, and promote more effective, sustainable, and just outcomes.”

Actions, alerts, resources 

Take the Pledge! Solidarity with Salvadoran Water Defenders ​​​​​​​#EyesOnSantaMarta
CISPES, October 4, 2024 
“On October 8, the trial begins against the #SantaMarta5 water defenders, leaders in the historic struggle against mining in El Salvador, despite the lack of evidence against them. As the Nayib Bukele government indicates intentions to bring mining back to the country and given its use of the legal system to persecute political opponents, international attention for this historic case is urgent now more than ever! 

Join the #EyesOnSantaMarta Pledge to stay informed and ready to respond should these historic leaders not be acquitted. Check out @CISPES @CSantaMarta1987 and the #CasoSantaMarta #EyesOnSantaMarta hashtags for online updates!”

• *The Migration News Brief is a selection of relevant news articles, all of which do not necessarily reflect the viewpoint of the Latin America Working Group.

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