Mexico Apprehends and Deports More Central Americans Than the United States

The Associated Press reports that Mexico apprehended 92,889 Central Americans between October 2014 and April 2015, while the United States detained 70,226 “other than Mexican” illegal aliens during that period, the majority of whom are Guatemalan, Honduran and El Salvadoran citizens.

The AP report depicts different “deportation” trends between Mexico and the United States based on apprehension statistics, but that is inaccurate because the Central American illegal aliens picked up by Mexico are being deported while those picked up by the U.S. Border Patrol are not.

Noting the current apprehension statistics, AP writes, “That was a huge reversal from the same period a year earlier, when the wave of migrants and unaccompanied minors from Central America was building. From October 2013 to April 2014, the United States apprehended 159,103 “other than Mexicans,” three times the 49,893 Central Americans detained by Mexico. The difference is Mexico’s new Southern Border Program, an initiative that included sending 5,000 federal police to the border with Guatemala and more border and highway checkpoints. Raids on migrants increased and authorities focused on keeping migrants off the northbound freight train known as ‘The Beast’.”

Mexico created the Southern Border Program at the request of the United States after the huge influx of Central American minors and families in 2014. Prior to that, Mexican immigration officials ignored the illegal aliens seeking to pass through Mexico on the way to the United States.

As AP writes, “Mexico has proved the more efficient in deportations, which is already causing concerns among human rights groups about the new tactics. In most cases, Mexico holds migrants only long enough to verify their nationalities, and quickly bundles them aboard buses to take them back to their home countries.”

That is not the case in the United States, where most who claim “credible fear” can remain pending an asylum court case, as long as the Border Patrol can’t prove the person has a criminal record.

Read more from the Associated Press.