JUAREZ CITY .- “As long as one does not have any (criminal) record, they should give us the opportunity,” he says on Mexican soil, 50 meters from USARolando Villán, an Ecuadorian migrant about a new proposed rule that accelerates the denial of asylum to those who represent a danger to American security.
Upon learning of the initiative that has been promoted since this Thursday by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) from the US, Villán assured that he is not part of the group targeted by the immigration measure, and that he considers it understandable.
“They (the United States government) also do it for their safety, and as in every country, they must respect the laws that each country has,” added this 49-year-old man in Ciudad Juárez, Mexican state of Chihuahua.
On the Mexican shore of a dry part of the Rio Grande, which serves as a dividing line, and carrying a puppy who wears a tiny cap that protects him from the sun, Villán says he lived until four years ago in Miami, Florida, working as a driver. of trailer.
“While I was expediting my immigration situation, they asked me to leave the country to wait in my country and while I was there (in Ecuador) they never gave me an appointment” to continue my immigration process, he adds after five months of traveling as a migrant.
He considers his asylum request genuine “now that there are so many criminal gangs” and for the fact that he has “four children who were born in the United States.”
Other undocumented migrants reacted with the same calmness to the new regulation proposed by President Joe Biden’s administration, which allows asylum applications to be denied in a matter of days if there is evidence that they can be rejected for reasons of “terrorism, national security or criminal “.
“I don’t know what those policies are and if someone owes something, my opinion is that they pay it,” said Ariel Doblado, originally from Honduras, where he worked in a clothing maquiladora until unemployment left him on the street, at the mercy of criminal groups.
Doblado, 21, and Villán are separated from the United States by three barbed wire barriers installed by the government of Texas, and the border wall of the United States federal government.
“You have to cross these three wire ropes, and your American dream is to cross and then you risk your life, you cut yourself… they should remove that and allow you to get to the wall, and there the immigration people will receive you, well, stop “start your asylum process,” explains Doblado.
The proposed DHS rule will go through a public comment process and could undergo changes before taking effect.
In March, the US border patrol intercepted migrants and asylum seekers, mostly Latin Americans, who illegally crossed the border with Mexico 189,372 times, according to official data.
Source: With information from AFP
