Migrant Crisis? What’s Really Happening At Mexican Border

Reprinted with permission from Alternet

In right-wing media, one often hears the bogus claim that President Joe Biden, like former President Barack Obama before him, favors an open-borders policy to immigration. But proponents of comprehensive immigration reform are quick to respond that Biden doesn't favor opens borders any more than Obama did when he was president. And MSNBC reporter Jacob Soboroff, speaking to activists on the Mexican side of the U.S./Mexico border, found that none of the people he interviewed believed that Biden had adopted an ultra-liberal immigration policy.

Soboroff, reporting for MSNBC, entered Tijuana, Mexico from California and found an abundance of "refugees from all over the world" who were hoping to enter the U.S. and finding it to be a major uphill climb. The reporter explained that that they were "trying to find out how, if at all, the policies under the Biden administration are different than under the Trump administration."

Some of the refugees Soboroff encountered were Haitians who were still in dire straights because of a massive earthquake that hit the country in 2010. Others were refugees from countries in Central America who have been facing harsh economic circumstances because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Erika Pinheiro, an immigration activist with the group Al Otro Lado (which means "To the Other Side" in Spanish), told Soboroff that in terms of immigration policies, "Not much has changed since Trump. They've only processed a handful of people each day."

Pinheiro said of the refugees, "The vast majority of people have been in Tijuana for at least a year, sometimes two."