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International treaties covering asylum seekers require that they apply for asylum in the first safe country. Mexico might not be the most wonderful place, but i

• dragonwriter 8y ago
  > Mexico might not be the most wonderful place, but it is considered a safe country. (the government is not genocidal) Even in the parts of the country superficially under control of the central government (the parts where the cartels don't openly operate marked patrol vehicles as if they were the government), the cartels operate with virtual impunity and frequently with active, high-level cooperation by the police and military (whole specialized units of which have gone over to the other side and become cartels), including the military at least cooperating in and covering up and possibly actually carrying out mass killings on behalf of the cartels. And this isn't just violence unrelated to the violence Central American asylum seekers are fleeing; that violence they are fleeing is in no small part due to deportation of violent criminals, often in gangs of US origin connected to international organized crime including the Mexican cartels, deported from the US, who have then extended the criminal networks of the already internationally-connected, US-origin gangs across Central America. The idea that Mexico is a safe country for those who have a reason to flee the violence in Central America is, well, not something that can be reconciled with the nature and source of the violence in Central America and the conditions in Mexico.
  • tropo 8y ago
    Well, that isn't how the treaties define a safe country. Mexico is not trying to exterminate anybody from Central America. Mere crime, even highly organized or widespread crime, doesn't disqualify Mexico. The country is safe by the standards of the international treaties. BTW, about this claim that people are fleeing violence... why should we take that at face value? Could they be fleeing the law? They could in fact be the cause of the violence. We have no way to conduct background checks.
    • dragonwriter 8y ago
      > Well, that isn't how the treaties define a safe country As the grounds for asylum or refugee status (the difference is in where you apply) in both international and US domestic law include both threats from the government and from groups the government is unwilling or unable to control, the fact that the same nongovernment and not-restrained-by-government groups one is fleeing from are operating in and not effectively constrained by the government in another country would make that country unsafe. > BTW, about this claim that people are fleeing violence... why should we take that at face value No, we should have a non-rubber-stamp application and review process theat evaluates evidence. Which, newsflash, we have for asylum seekers (actually, we have two of them—the “affirmative” and “defensive” asylum processes), and that is exactly what the Administration is trying to prevent them from accessing.
      • tropo 8y ago
        The review is pretty simple. They were welcomed to apply for asylum in Mexico and refused to do so: case closed. The administration is not trying to prevent them from accessing that offer. Clearly, it is not asylum that they seek. At best, they are shopping around for the most lucrative benefits. If they just wanted asylum, heading south would have made as much sense as heading north -- and more if Mexico is really so scary. Costa Rica, Panama, and Colombia are all safe countries. You want a review process that evaluates evidence, but how? A person shows up with a coached sob story and forged or missing identity. If it were just one person, perhaps we could have the CIA spend a few million dollars in a possibly futile effort to uncover the person's past. With so many people, that is simply not possible. What you are proposing is that we accept the word of these people, meaning that 100% of them would qualify. That is unrestricted entry.