In the wake of President Joe Biden's recent suspension of asylum processing at the U.S.-Mexico border, Gerardo Henao, a Colombian national, found himself in an unusual situation.
Arrested by the Border Patrol, Henao was not deported as one might expect. Instead, he was released at a San Diego bus stop, from where he embarked on a journey to Newark, New Jersey. This unexpected turn of events was largely due to the lack of deportation flights to Colombia, a situation that highlights the logistical and diplomatic challenges the Biden administration faces in implementing its sweeping immigration measures.
As reported by AP News, Henao, who fled his jewelry business in Medellin, Colombia, due to relentless extortion attempts, benefited from the scarcity of deportation flights to his home country. The Biden administration's policy, which came into effect this week, acknowledges that "operational considerations" limit the government's ability to deport all those subject to the measure. This is particularly true for individuals from countries in South America, Asia, Africa, and Europe, who have only recently begun to arrive at the border.
The Homeland Security Department, in a document detailing the ban, stated that the "demographics and nationalities encountered at the border significantly impact" its capacity to deport individuals. Despite these challenges, thousands of migrants have been deported under the ban, according to two senior Homeland Security Department officials. The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, revealed that there have been 17 deportation flights, including one to Uzbekistan, deporting individuals from Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Peru, and Mexico.
Henao, 59, was informed of the ban by a Border Patrol agent after being apprehended on a dirt road near a high-voltage power line in the mountains east of San Diego. The agent processed Henao's release papers, instructing him to appear in an immigration court in New Jersey on October 23. The agent briefly inquired about Henao's reasons for leaving Colombia but did not delve deeper into the matter.
Henao's experience at the San Diego transit center, where the Border Patrol dropped off four busloads of migrants in a four-hour span, was relatively straightforward. "They took my photo, my fingerprints and that was it," Henao said. The migrants released that day hailed from a variety of countries, including China, India, Colombia, and Ecuador.
The new policy suspends asylum when arrests for illegal crossings reach 2,500 a day and resumes when they average below 1,500 for a week straight. Border officials have been instructed to prioritize detaining migrants who can be easily deported, followed by those from "hard to remove" and "very hard to remove" nationalities. These instructions were confirmed by a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity, as reported by the New York Post.
Theresa Cardinal Brown, senior adviser for immigration and border policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington think tank, acknowledged the challenges faced by Homeland Security. She emphasized the limitations of government resources for detention and removal, particularly for countries that are uncooperative in accepting deported individuals.
U.S. Immigration and Customs and Enforcement conducted 679 deportation flights from January through May, with nearly 60% of them going to Guatemala and Honduras, according to Witness at the Border, an advocacy group. However, the number of flights to Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru was relatively small, considering the tens of thousands of illegal entries from these countries each month.
The situation is even more complex with countries like Mexico, which, despite being the easiest country for removals, accounted for less than 3 of 10 border arrests in the government's last fiscal year. Some countries refuse to accept flights to avoid being overwhelmed, as Corey Price, then-director of ICE enforcement and removal operations, explained in an interview last year.
Price, who retired last month, emphasized that the U.S. does not have unilateral control over deportations. "We dont decide unilaterally, OK, were sending your citizen back to you. No, that country still has to agree to take them back," he said. This highlights the intricate web of diplomatic, logistical, and resource-related challenges that the U.S. government must navigate in its efforts to manage immigration effectively.
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