Brazilians fleeing a grinding economic crisis, food shortages, and a devastating wave of COVID-19 infections have joined the surge of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The South American nation is facing a set of dire economic and public health circumstances that have prompted droves to head to the U.S. border, where 8,745 adults and children were encountered by U.S. Border Patrol agents after attempting to enter between the land ports of entry illegally. Brazilians made up nearly 5% of the 178,622 people encountered at the southern border in all of April, even outpacing the record-high 6,035 Venezuelans seen last month.
The coronavirus pandemic hit Brazil harder this year than last, prompting domestic crises that citizens are attempting to flee. Ten percent of the 161 million known coronavirus cases worldwide have been documented in Brazil, where the pandemic took a turn for the worse this spring. Sixteen million, or 8% of the country’s 200 million residents, have contracted the virus. More than 450,000 people have died, according to the Johns Hopkins University tracker.
Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro has downplayed the threat of the coronavirus even as a new variant spreads across South America. At the onset of the pandemic in 2020, the Brazilian government implemented a welfare program that provided approximately $55 billion to 68 million people. It kept Brazil’s economy afloat for months but was stopped late last year before a far worse wave of the coronavirus rocked the country starting in January. The welfare program was restarted in the spring but with far lower payments and to fewer people.
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The country was already struggling to dig out from the 2014-2016 recession before the coronavirus hit, according to Jessica Bolter, associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington. Over the past year, the labor market has collapsed as workers cannot return to their jobs, according to the government’s economic research institute. Unlike the United States, Brazil has not rolled out a mass vaccination plan that would enable society to return to normal. Millions remain out of work and businesses have closed, while food prices continue to rise.
“In addition to these difficult economic conditions, some are likely fleeing violence and insecurity — for example, two-thirds of Brazilians said they were always or almost always fearful of being a victim of violent crime as of 2018,” Bolter wrote in an email. “At the same time, the U.S. economy is reopening and information may have spread among potential migrants that now is a good time to try to cross the border.”
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Hundreds to several thousands of Brazilians have historically migrated to the U.S. each year but at far lower rates. Federal data that tracks encounters of illegal immigrants between 2007 and 2019 shows several hundred people to 3,200 were encountered in a full year, with the exception of the humanitarian border crisis in 2019. That year, nearly 18,000 Brazilians arrived at the border.
Nearly all Brazilian migrants are being admitted under the Biden administration. Of the more than 8,700 Brazilians encountered at the border in April, just 238 were returned south of the border or to South America, while 8,507 were taken into custody.
Border officials categorize migrants who arrive at the U.S. land border as either single adults, families, or unaccompanied children. Children are admitted into the U.S. under a law that protects minors who arrive alone. Roughly 90% of adult illegal immigrants have been turned away under a policy that was implemented by the Trump administration in March 2020. While, normally, adults would be taken into custody and possibly face charges, the Border Patrol is not taking adults into custody in an effort to prevent the spread of the coronavirus in its holding stations.
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Families who come across the border are supposed to be sent back under the same public health protocol, but most are being allowed into the country and released because of the government’s inability to detain them during immigration court proceedings. Among Brazilians, 4,290 of the 8,745 who arrived in April were part of a family group. All but 166 of the family members were not turned away. Among single adults, 4181 were encountered and only 71 turned away. All 36 children who arrived were taken into custody and will be released to adult sponsors in the U.S. or placed in foster homes across the country.
