Border political battle brews

With more than 220,000 migrants having made their way to the US' southwest border in March, political pressure is mounting on the Biden administration not to remove a public health restriction that limits entry into the country.

The administration has said that on May 23, it will lift Title 42, a World War II-era authority that has been used during the COVID-19 pandemic to turn migrants away for public safety reasons.

US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) said in its monthly operational statistics released on April 15 that 221,303 migrants were encountered at the southwest border last month.

In March 2021, 173,277 migrants were met; in March 2020, that number was 34,460.

There were a record 1,026,460 encounters in the first six months of fiscal year 2022, which began in October. By contrast, in the first six months of FY 2021, there were 570,826 encounters.

The situation at the border has raised alarm among Republicans and an increasing number of Democrats and is likely to be a major political issue ahead of November's midterm congressional elections.

US Representative Henry Cuellar, a Texas Democrat, said Sunday that his constituents are concerned about a lifting of Title 42.

"They're not only public officials but other folks, and none of them said, 'Yes, go ahead and lift Title 42,'" Cuellar told Fox News Sunday. "And none of them said, 'Open up the border.' They are very concerned because they are on the front lines, and they're the ones I think we need to listen to."

Texas' Republican Governor Greg Abbott called the situation at the border "the worst that I have ever seen it".

"Texas is doing everything we possibly can to contain a completely out-of-control situation," Abbott said on Fox News' Sunday Morning Futures. "Something else has never happened before, and that is, the Texas National Guard, they have turned back more than 15,000 people who attempted to come across the border illegally," he said.

US Senator Ron Johnson, a Wisconsin Republican, said Sunday, "You don't have a sovereign nation if you don't have a secure border." Johnson, who was interviewed on WABC Radio in New York, said that the situation at the border was allowing human traffickers "to pocket billions of dollars".

Nevada's Democratic Governor Steve Sisolak, in a letter to President Joe Biden on April 20, stated: "To be clear: asylum seekers and migrants hoping to legally immigrate to the United States should be afforded every proper opportunity to do so, and as COVID-19 enters the endemic stage with vaccines and testing readily available, it is time to reevaluate the public health measures in place.

"However, lifting Title 42 without a measured, comprehensive plan would create chaos at our border and make it more onerous for families attempting to immigrate legally."

US Senator Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat who has previously clashed with the administration on fiscal issues, called the decision to end the order "frightening".

"We are already facing an unprecedented increase in migrants this year, and that will only get worse if the administration ends the Title 42 policy," he said. "We are nowhere near prepared to deal with that influx."

The decision to remove Title 42 was made by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

When asked of the Biden administration's plans, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told CNN: "I say, number one, that we have plans. We are executing on those plans. I think we have to be very mindful of the fact that we are addressing enemies, and those enemies are the cartels and the smugglers, and I will not provide our plans to them.

"We are going to proceed with our execution, carefully, methodically, in anticipating different scenarios," he added.

Title 42 was dusted off in March 2020 under former president Donald Trump to remove the majority of migrants who showed up at the border during the coronavirus pandemic.

The Biden administration confirmed on April 1 that it would be lifting the order late next month. Since the announcement, border officials have been encountering between 7,000 and 8,000 migrants daily on average.

The CBP statement shows that in March, 123,304 migrants were removed — 109,549 under Title 42, while 80,127 were released into the US, including 36,777 who were given humanitarian parole, which makes them eligible for work permits.

On April 21, 21 states asked a federal judge in Louisiana to immediately block the administration from halting Title 42. Earlier this month, Arizona, Louisiana and Missouri filed a lawsuit against the decision to end Title 42. More than a dozen states, mostly Republican-led, joined the lawsuit.

"This suit challenges an imminent, man-made, self-inflicted calamity: the abrupt elimination of the only safety valve preventing this administration's disastrous border policies from devolving into an unmitigated catastrophe," the states' complaint says.

The migrants appearing at the border are coming from different regions.

By nationality, Mexicans made up the largest group of those encountered at the border in March, followed by Cubans, according to CBP data. The number of Ukrainians, who are generally being allowed into the country on humanitarian parole, increased to more than 200 in March from five in November.

The administration will introduce a streamlined program for Ukrainian nationals seeking humanitarian entry into the US. Starting April 25, "Uniting for Ukraine" will allow US residents and organizations to apply to the Department of Homeland Security to sponsor Ukrainians who have been displaced by the military conflict with Russia.

In fiscal year 2021, migrants came from 106 countries, as far away as Eastern Europe and Africa, according to a CBP release.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.