Category Archives: US immigration

Eight-year-old boy dies as migrants risk Arctic conditions to cross river into US

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Child drowned while crossing the freezing Rio Grande with his family amid unprecedented weather conditions at US-Mexico border

An eight-year-old Honduran boy has become the latest victim in a string of drownings on the US-Mexico border as migrants attempt to cross the Rio Grande in treacherous winter conditions.

The child, who has not been named, drowned on Wednesday while attempting to cross the freezing river with his family amid unprecedented Arctic conditions in the borderlands which have killed more than 30 people and left millions in Mexico and Texas without power, water and food.

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Harry and Meghan to break silence in Oprah Winfrey interview

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Couple, who are expecting second child, to give first interview since quitting as senior royals

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex will break their silence in their first interview since quitting their roles as senior royals when they sit down with Oprah Winfrey next month.

Prince Harry and Meghan, who revealed on Sunday they are expecting their second child, announced their plans to step back from the royal family on 8 January last year.

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Outcry as more than 20 babies and children deported by US to Haiti

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Ice accused of sending ‘defenseless babies into the burning house’ as deportations of 72 carried out in apparent breach of Biden order

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) deported at least 72 people to Haiti on Monday, including a two-month-old baby and 21 other children, in an apparent flagrant breach of the Biden administration’s orders only to remove suspected terrorists and potentially dangerous convicted felons.

The children were deported to Haiti on Monday on two flights chartered by Ice from Laredo, Texas to the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince. The removals sent vulnerable infants back to Haiti as it is being roiled by major political unrest.

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Migrants speak of ‘inhumane’ conditions at Ice detention centers during Covid – video

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Migrants have shared their experiences at privately-run US Immigation and Customs Enforcement (Ice) detention centers during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Alonzo and Javier were held at La Palma Correctional Center; they alleged the treatment many received was ‘inhumane’. At Eloy Detention Center, Carmen claimed medical staff would only tell them to ‘drink water’ regardless of symptoms. José, who was held at Central Arizona Florence Correctional Complex and La Palma, said for months he was barely able to go outside. Alejandro, who was also held at Central Arizona Florence, said at times there were up to 64 people living in his tank.

These audio recordings were captured as part of a project covering the world’s largest for-profit immigration detention system. ‘We’ve commodified human displacement,’ said artist David Taylor, who in recent months used drones to take aerial photography and video of centers near the US southern border, in California, Arizona and Texas.

All detainees featured in this video were held at facilities operated by CoreCivic, which disputes allegations about conditions and said it was committed to health and safety.

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Exclusive: Ice cancels deportation flight to Africa after claims of brutality

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  • Ice agents allegedly forced asylum seekers to agree to expulsion
  • Flight was due to leave from Louisiana at 3pm on Wednesday

US immigration and customs enforcement (Ice) canceled a deportation flight to west Africa because of allegations of brutality by Ice agents in the treatment of the deportees, the agency has said in a statement.

The statement emailed to the Guardian and the cancellation of the deportation flight, so that would-be deportees can be interviewed as witnesses, marks a dramatic change in tone by the agency, which has hitherto deflected and denied earlier allegations of human rights abuses.

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New claims of migrant abuse as Ice defies Biden to continue deportations

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Ice condemned as ‘rogue agency’ after rights groups allege torture by agents and man deported to Haiti who had never been there

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) has been denounced as a “rogue agency” after new allegations of assaults on asylum seekers emerged, and deportations of African and Caribbean migrants continued in defiance of the Biden administration’s orders.

Joe Biden unveiled his immigration agenda on Tuesday, and his homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas was confirmed by the Senate, but the continued deportations suggested the Biden White House still does not have full control of Ice, which faces multiple allegations of human rights abuses and allegations that it has disproportionately targeted black migrants.

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‘A moral and national shame’: Biden to launch taskforce to reunite families separated at border

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President decries Trump administration that ‘literally ripped children from the arms of their families’ as he signs executive orders

Joe Biden plans to create a taskforce to reunify families separated at the US-Mexico border by the Trump administration, as part of a new series of immigration executive actions signed at an Oval Office ceremony on Tuesday.

Biden condemned Donald Trump’s immigration policies as a “stain on the reputation” of the US.

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US to resume deporting asylum seekers after judge rejects Biden order

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Trump-appointed judge ruled against president’s 100-day suspension, raising questions over whether Ice will resist reform

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) is preparing to resume deportations of asylum seekers after a Trump-appointed Texas judge ruled against a 100-day suspension ordered by Joe Biden.

The ruling, in response to a challenge from a leading figure in the Republican effort to overturn the election result, marks the first shot in a legal rearguard action by Trump loyalists intended to stymie the Biden administration’s agenda.

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The migrants Trump forced Mexico to stop: Ada Trillo’s best photograph

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‘Trump had threatened Mexico with tariffs if it let in this caravan from Honduras. Two hours after crossing this river, many were teargassed then deported’

I had been following a migrant caravan north from San Pedro Sula, Honduras, for around 10 days. It was 23 January 2020, and this was the moment the group crossed the Suchiate river, which divides Guatemala from Mexico.

The Mexican authorities had deployed the national guard to stop the caravan entering their country because Trump had threatened to increase tariffs on Mexican goods coming into the United States if they let migrants in. Previously, migrants had been allowed to traverse the length of Mexico with no problem.

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‘It gives us hope’: migrants stranded in Mexico buoyed by prospect of Biden reform

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The president-elect has promised to do away with ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy, raising hopes that asylum seekers claims will be treated seriously

Selma López, 31, has spent nearly a year holed up in a two-room house not far from Mexico’s border with the US, along with her 11-year-old son Darikson and another woman who also made the long journey from Honduras in search of a new life.

Related: Remain in Mexico policy needlessly exposed migrants to harm, report says

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Trump administration to deport man to Haiti who has never been there

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Financial consultant Paul Pierrilus came to the US with his parents, who are both US citizens, when he was five

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) is to carry out a final deportation flight of the Trump era on Tuesday, with a plane bound for Haiti whose passengers include a man who is not a Haitian citizen, and who has never been there.

Paul Pierrilus, a 40-year-old financial consultant from Rockland County, New York, was born in the French Caribbean territory of Saint Martin, according to a birth certificate supplied by his family, who said he came to the US with his parents when he was five. His sister and parents are US citizens.

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Pink seesaws across US-Mexico border named Design of the Year 2020

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Creators say they hope the work encourages people to build bridges between communities

A collection of bright pink seesaws that allowed people to interact over the US-Mexico border has won the prestigious Design of the Year award, with its creators saying they hoped the work encourages people to build bridges between communities.

The Teeter Totter Wall, which bridged across El Paso in Texas and Ciudad Juárez in Mexico during a 40-minute session, was described as not only feeling “symbolically important” but also highlighting “the possibility of things” by the judging panel.

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Migrant caravan trekking north to US border clashes with Guatemalan troops

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  • Honduran migrants began crossing Guatemalan border Friday
  • Troops use teargas, shields and sticks to repel weary travellers

Truncheon-wielding Guatemalan troops have clashed with Central American asylum seekers trying to push their way north towards the US border as Donald Trump’s presidency entered its final days.

Thousands of mostly Honduran migrants began crossing the Guatemalan border on Friday night, having set off on foot from the Honduran city of San Pedro Sula in the early hours of Thursday.

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‘My neighbourhood is being destroyed to pacify his supporters’: the race to complete Trump’s wall

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In his final months in office, Donald Trump has ramped up construction on his promised physical border between the US and Mexico – devastating wildlife habitats and increasing the migrant death toll

At Sierra Vista Ranch in Arizona near the Mexican border, Troy McDaniel is warming up his helicopter. McDaniel, tall and slim in a tan jumpsuit, began taking flying lessons in the 80s, and has since logged 2,000 miles in the air. The helicopter, a cosy, two-seater Robinson R22 Alpha is considered a work vehicle and used to monitor the 640-acre ranch, but it’s clear he relishes any opportunity to fly. “We will have no fun at all,” he deadpans.

McDaniel and his wife, Melissa Owen, bought their ranch and the 100-year-old adobe house that came with it in 2003. Years before, Owen began volunteering at the nearby Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge, and fell in love with the beauty and natural diversity of the area, as well as the quiet of their tiny town. That all changed last July when construction vehicles and large machinery started “barrelling down the two-lane state road”, says Owen.

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‘Heal the damage’: Activists urge Joe Biden to move beyond ‘border security’

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Biden has said he will end construction of Trump’s wall, but activists say they hope for more than a return to the status quo

As Joe Biden prepares to take office, activists say the president-elect must not only take meaningful action to stabilize the US-Mexico border, but also reckon with his own history of militarizing the border landscape and communities.

Biden has promised to end many of the Trump administration’s border policies, but has yet to unveil the kind of bold immigration plan that would suggest a true departure from Obama-era priorities. Cecilia Muñoz, Obama’s top immigration adviser who memorably defended the administration’s decision to deport hundreds of thousands of immigrants, was recently added to Biden’s transition team.

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Judge rules Daca suspension invalid, Homeland Security head in office illegally

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Chad Wolf took office unlawfully, says federal court judge, therefore could not suspend program that shields young people from deportation

A federal judge in New York has ruled that the acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Chad Wolf, assumed his position unlawfully and has invalidated Wolf’s suspension of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca) program, which shields young people from deportation.

“DHS failed to follow the order of succession as it was lawfully designated,” the US District Judge Nicholas Garaufis wrote.

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US deports migrants who accuse detention center gynecologist of abuse

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Six former patients who complained about Dr Mahendra Amin, who has been accused of operating without consent, deported

The Trump administration is trying to deport several women who allege they were mistreated by a Georgia gynecologist at an immigration detention center, according to their lawyers.

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) has already deported six former patients who complained about Dr Mahendra Amin, who has been accused of operating on migrant women without their consent or performing procedures that were medically unnecessary and potentially endangered their ability to have children.

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US steps up deportation of Haitians ahead of election, raising Covid fears

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The Trump administration justifies the expulsions under a public health law but critics say they risk spreading coronavirus in the Caribbean nation

US immigration authorities have radically stepped up deportation flights to Haiti in the weeks before the election, raising concerns over returned migrants’ safety on their return home and the risks of spreading coronavirus in the impoverished Caribbean state.

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Trump aide Stephen Miller preparing second-term immigration blitz

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The hardline adviser is said to be ready to unleash executive orders deemed too extreme for a president seeking re-election

The architect of Donald Trump’s hardline immigration policy, senior adviser Stephen Miller, is said to have a drawer full of executive orders ready to be signed in “shock and awe” style if Trump is re-elected.

The former homeland security department chief of staff, Miles Taylor, said this wishlist was reserved for the second term because it included policies that were too unpopular for a president seeking re-election.

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Trump v Biden: the key moments of the final presidential debate – video highlights

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Joe Biden and Donald Trump have gone head-to-head for the final time before the US election on 3 November in the final television debate, helped by a mute button on the candidates’ microphones that prevented interruptions.

Squaring off in Nashville, Biden had to field aggressive questioning about his son’s business dealings and when Trump compared himself to Abraham Lincoln, the challenger branded his opponent 'one of the most racist presidents we’ve had in modern history'. Here is a look back at the key moments

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