McALLEN — The United States government has begun requesting migrants who do not have a passport who undergo technology of facial recognition to board domestic flights under a change that created confusion this week among immigrants and activist groups in Texas.
It’s unclear when the change took effect, but several migrants with flights leaving South Texas on Tuesday told advocacy groups they thought they were being turned away. Among the migrants were people who used the government’s online appointment system to process their immigration cases.
Pro-immigrant groups were also concerned about migrants who had crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally and were processed by Border Patrol agents and released while their immigration cases were resolved.
The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) said Thursday that migrants without proper photo identification who want to board flights will be required to undergo facial recognition technology to verify their identity against Department of Security files. National Security Agency (DHS).
“If TSA cannot match your identity with DHS records, you will not be able to enter secure areas of the airport and will be denied boarding,” the agency said.
Agency officials did not specify when the TSA made the change, saying only that it was recent and was not in response to a specific security threat.
At the moment it is unknown how many migrants could be affected. Some have foreign passports.
Migrants and overwhelmed communities on the US-Mexico border are increasingly relying on airlines to transport migrants to other cities where they have friends and family, and where the Border Patrol often orders them to go for their immigration procedures. immigration.
Groups that work with migrants said the change took them by surprise. Migrants wondered if they could lose hundreds of dollars spent on non-refundable airline tickets. After a group of migrants returned to a shelter in McAllen on Tuesday, saying they were “turned away” at the airport, advocates exchanged messages trying to find out what the new TSA procedures were.
“It caused tremendous distress to people,” said the Rev. Brian Strassburger, executive director of Borders Del Camino Jesuit Ministry, a group in Texas that provides humanitarian aid and advocates for migrants.
Strassburger said migrants were previously able to board flights with documents issued to them by the Border Patrol.
An Ecuadorian woman traveling with her son said she was able to board safely Wednesday after she allowed agents to take her photo at a TSA checkpoint.
Source: With information from AP
