The U.S. is expanding the geographical location from which migrants can legally apply to enter the country from Mexico, something that could reduce transit flows to the southern border.
Concretely, U.S. officials said Saturday that CBP One, the app through which migrants can apply for an appointment with authorities in ports of entry, will now be available from the Mexican states of Chiapas and Tabasco. The amount of appointments granted daily will seemingly remain unchanged at 1,450, as authorities did not announce any changes in that area.
The decision follows a request from Mexican authorities, which has stepped up its efforts to crack down on immigration amid increased cooperation with the U.S. throughout the year.
"We consistently engage with our partners in the Government of Mexico and work together to adjust policies and practices in response to the latest migration trends and security needs," CBP said in a statement.
Over 680,000 people scheduled appointments through the app between January 2023 and June of this year, the government body said. Until now, appointments could only be requested from northern states, leading migrants to embark on long journeys throughout Mexico in order to reach areas from where they could apply. The measure could help alleviate some of those flows.
Venezuelans, Cubans and Haitians are the top nationalities, along with Mexicans. The U.S. recently limited the amount of appointments for the latter nationality given the large amount of requests.
The U.S. government has recently commended its Mexican counterpart for cracking down on migration, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken saying in mid-July that "thanks to the strong steps that Mexico has taken, the strong leadership that both President Biden and President López Obrador have shown, we've seen in this moment, at least, a dramatic decrease in the number of irregular migrants seeking to transit the border."
"At the same time, we're determined together to work on making sure that migration is orderly, is safe, and is humane. And I greatly appreciate everything that we've been working on together to do that," he added.
Apprehensions at the southern border have continued to drop sharply over the past months, so much so that they could reach a threshold that would allow the government to lift its ban on asylum seeking.
Arrests have dropped 30% month-over-month in July, reaching a new low for the Biden administration. Customs and Border Patrol expects the final figure to be around 57,000, down from over 83,500 in June and far below the over more than 250,000 in December last year. It would also be the lowest figure since September 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic contributed to a large drop in movement across the continent.
Border crossings had been dropping throughout the year as immigration became an electoral liability for then-President Joe Biden. But they began to plummet as of June 5, when the administration began implementing an executive action cracking down on asylum seeking for those crossing the border illegally.
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