MIAMI — The U.S. Department of Homeland and Security has a warning to undocumented Haitians en route to its southwestern border with Mexico — turn around. Otherwise, you will be deported back to Haiti.
After a six-year moratorium on deportations to the earthquake-scarred country, the Obama administration is resuming them, citing “improved conditions in Haiti” since the devastating Jan. 12, 2010, earthquake and “a significant increase in Haitians arriving at the Southwest border in San Diego, Calif.”
“The United States has recently witnessed a sharp increase in the number of Haitian nationals taking dangerous smuggling routes to apply for admission to our country in the San Diego, Calif., area without advance authorization,” said an official with DHS, which announced the policy shift Thursday.
In fiscal year 2015, the U.S. Customs and Border Patrol only apprehended 339 Haitians at the San Ysidro Port of Entry, the world’s busiest border crossing, officials said. But that number jumped sharply from Oct. 1, 2015, to Sept. 4, with officials processing more than 5,000 Haitians at the California entry point, overwhelming the facility, which is undergoing construction.
At the top of the deportation list are those apprehended at the U.S. borders or ports of entries who do not possess a credible fear of persecution or torture; convicted felons and those convicted of significant or multiple misdemeanors; and an estimated 2,000 Haitians with a final order of deportation already issued by a U.S. immigration judge.
Haitian nationals currently covered by Temporary Protected Status, an immigration benefit granted to tens of thousands a day after the earthquake, are not affected by the policy change. But the policy change will affect thousands of Haitians stranded in Panama, Costa Rica and in transit through other Central and South American nations from Brazil to the U.S.-Mexico border.
Warned of the policy shift ahead of Thursday’s announcement, Haitian government officials said while they are prepared to receive those sent back, they will not accept them under all conditions.
Interim President Jocelerme Privert, who met President Barack Obama on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York Tuesday, told the Miami Herald that the issue of migration was raised during their brief exchange. While the flow of Haitians wasn’t raised specifically, Privert said he knows that it’s a concern for many of Haiti’s neighbors.
“The solution to this problem is to create new conditions, new opportunities for people to work,” he said, noting that he recently created a commission in Port-au-Prince to look at the matter, including how to handle repatriations. “That requires political stability and elections that are honest, transparent and credible, which is what I am working for.”
The perilous journeys, which start in Brazil, have taxed not just U.S. Customs and Border Patrol officials at the San Ysidro border entry near San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico, but also “the capacities of the governments they’ve been transiting through.”
A Haitian-American activist who has been assisting newly arriving Haitians in San Diego had one word for the new policy: “Heartbroken,” said Guerline Jozef.
“Turn them back to what?” she asked. “The people risk their lives to get here in hope of a better life.”
DHS officials said if Haitians, who are in transit, do not want to be repatriated to Haiti, they should return to Brazil, which in the aftermath of the earthquake gave Haitians special residency status for them to live, work and receive social services.
“Haitian nationals report that they are leaving Brazil in light of the economic downturn and lack of jobs,” a DHS official said. “We cannot remove folks coming from Brazil to Brazil without the cooperation of the Brazilian authorities. We are only able to remove them to Haiti.”