The Trump administration plans to press Mexico on its campaign to stop illegal immigration across its border and into the United States, including demanding it keep Africans, Indians, and others trying to enter the country.
Officials told us that the administration, pleased with the “Remain in Mexico” policy of keeping Latin Americans seeking U.S. asylum or other immigration status on the other side of the border, wants it broadened to include non-Hispanics.
“We want to expand who’s remaining in Mexico really to anyone from anywhere around the world, as opposed to just the local region of the Western Hemisphere,” Ken Cuccinelli, acting deputy secretary of Homeland Security, said in an interview.
The goal is to broaden the population of immigrants held by Mexico to the growing number of those from other countries trying to sneak across the southern border.
Under that plan, “people from anywhere in the world … can remain in Mexico, even if they are not, say, Spanish-speaking or from the Western Hemisphere,” he said.
Cuccinelli explained that border officials are seeing more people from Africa and especially India try to enter with refugee and asylum claims that officials doubt. “You name it, we’re getting them from everywhere, at least attempted, and because of our detention limitations, having the ‘Remain in Mexico’ program is an enormous aid to this security issue and the ability to manage it,” he said.
He added that the administration is also set to press Mexico to do more to meet its earlier promises to lower the number of illegal immigrants trying to cross the border.
“Mexico anticipated, I’ll say committed, to getting illegal immigration at our border down to certain numbers, and we haven’t reached those numbers yet,” said the No. 2 immigration chief.
“We feel like they need to make up some points,” he added.
To press Mexico into action, he said that President Trump stands ready and eager to impose economic sanctions.
“This isn’t an idle threat,” said Cuccinelli. “We do have a president with an itchy trigger finger on tariffs. He’s ready, willing, and clearly able to implement those.”
The “Migration Protection Protocols” that led to the “Remain in Mexico” program have been a success so far. DHS officials said there are more than 60,000 immigrants once headed to the U.S. who are waiting in Mexico for U.S. courts to settle their cases.
In addition to cutting the number of border crossings, Cuccinelli and Mexican officials said that it has led to a reduction in those from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador even trying to enter Mexico because easy entry into the U.S. is no longer guaranteed.
“That was part of the purpose of our program, so that people understood there are actual consequences to their actions,” said Cuccinelli.
In the interview, he was effusive in his praise for Mexico and its new immigration National Guard force and what they have done so far, even though he wants more.
“We’ve got a neighbor to the south in Mexico that is doing more to address illegal immigration than Congress,” Cuccinelli told us.
“Mexico is actually intercepting and interdicting illegal flows into their own country and through their country at a level that I don’t think we’ve ever seen before,” he added.
