Safer Deportations Practices: Recommendations

Safer Deportations Practices: Recommendations

The repatriation of Mexican nationals is governed by a February 20, 2004 Memorandum of Understanding between the United States of America and the United States of Mexico on the “Safe, Orderly, Dignified and Humane Repatriation of Mexican Nationals.” To implement this, Regional Technical Working Groups (RTWG), comprised of regional staff from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the Mexican National Institute of Migration (INM), the Mexican Consulate General, and the Secretariat of Governance for the United States of Mexico craft Local Arrangements for Repatriation (LAR) which address times and locations for repatriation, as well as points of contact to receive and/or convey information about incidents involving reported mistreatment or potential human rights concerns. In addition to the 30 LAR that cover the border, various programs and DHS policies affect the way in which the deportation process is conducted.

Unfortunately, a number of current U.S. policies and practices endanger the health, welfare and safety of deported individuals. The concrete commonsense recommendations belowwould much improve the security situation for newly deported migrants.

1. End all night-time deportations: At each port of entry, U.S. authorities transport migrants to a predetermined location, often a public plaza. This allows local gangs, smugglers, traffickers and organized crime to easily identify and prey upon migrants and target them immediately upon arrival. When deportations happen in the middle of the night, when shelters and other NGOs are closed, migrants are especially vulnerable to attack, extortion or exploitation.

1. End family separation during the deportation process:DHS shoulddevelop and implement a standardized process to determine familial relationships among apprehended migrants and take steps to ensure that deportation practices do not needlessly separate family members, especially by deporting family members to different ports of entry from one another.

1. Do not deport individuals to particularly dangerous locations: Because of lateral repatriation policies, male migrants are increasingly deported to border towns so dangerous that U.S. government personnel are prohibited from being outside at night. For example, INM reports that deportations to the Mexican border state of Tamaulipas increased five-fold between 2006 and 2012, despite the fact that homicides—a key indicator of increasing danger—were rising.

1. Return all belongings prior to deportation: All belongings should be returned to migrants. In particular, the return of money, identity documents, medications, and cell phones are especially crucial for survival in the first few days after deportation and allow Mexican nationals to communicate with their families and interface with the Mexican government. Specifically, money should be returned in a usable form—for example, not as a U.S. domestic check that is difficult to cash in Mexico.

1. Provide prior notification toMexican authorities of people with special needs: Unaccompanied children, pregnant women, people with disabilities, people with serious medical conditions and elderly individuals may all require additional care, preparation and special transportation. Providing information to Mexican officials well-in-advance of implementing a deportationwould help these vulnerable individuals get the prompt and adequate care they need.This safeguard is already in place for deportations to Coahuila and should be extended throughout the border.

1. Provide opportunities for border NGO input: Provide a clear, transparent, and public process through which NGOs can supply U.S. authorities with information and input in advance of renegotiations of the LAR. NGOs often have crucial information about what services are available at what time, as well as challenges associated with safeguarding migrants’ lives in the context of current practices. When governments and NGOs work together, recently deported migrants are better served and protected.

Deportations and the denial of human dignity

The Hill

ByVery Rev. Thomas H. Smolich, S.J.

February 20, 2014

As President Obama’s administration approaches a record-setting two millionth deportation, an immigration enforcement “accomplishment” never achieved by any other president, many faith leaders are rightly focusing on the hardship that each of these deportations inflicts on families and communities torn apart by our broken immigration system. However, lost in this important debate as to whether Obama should suspend deportations is the dangerous manner in which these deportations are being carried out.

Migrants are frequently deported aftermidnightwithout identity documents, prescription medications and valuable personal belongings. Families are routinely split up during the deportation process, and men are, at times, deported to Mexican border towns the U.S. State Department has deemed too dangerous for tourists and its own personnel. Inadequate provision for the safety of particularly vulnerable people, including unaccompanied children, pregnant women, and elderly or infirm individuals, is a pervasive concern. Unsafe deportation practices also fuel the organized crime economy of Northern Mexico border towns by supplying women, men and children for robberies, extortions, kidnappings, and trafficking.

My Catholic faith teaches that all people are created in the image and likeness of God, possess human dignity and are worthy of respect. In its memorandum of understanding on the safe repatriation of Mexican nationals, the U.S. government recognizesin wordthe human dignity of the migrant by demanding that deportations to Mexico be carried out in a “safe, orderly, dignified and humane” manner. However, a review of the evidence indicates thatin deedthis commitment is not carried out.

Safe deportation procedures would not allow for deporting an individual at3 a.m. when local shelters close their doors at9 p.m., leaving the deported migrant at the mercy of local gangs or organized crime for the remainder of the night. An orderly deportation process would not fail to return a migrant’s money, cell phone or documents, stranding him on the border with no way to contact family, journey home, or prove his identity. A dignified deportation practice would not permit the deportation of a woman in serious medical distress without notifying Mexican authorities in advance so they can prepare for her care. A humane deportation does not separate family members, sending a woman and her children to one location while deporting her husband to a town hundreds of miles away without providing any information on the spouse’s whereabouts or how to reunite.

Unsafe deportations and careless disregard for the lives and security of migrants contribute to a humanitarian crisis on the other side of our border. This reality is undermining our nation’s commitment to preserve and protect human rights globally.

Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson has the authority, opportunity and the moral imperative to reform our nation’s deportation practices. He could do this by ending nighttime deportations and those to particularly dangerous locations, by maintaining family unity during the deportation process, and by ensuring the return of all migrants’ belongings.

It is immoral and intolerable that deportations so often endanger the lives of deportees and cause trauma and tragedy. I join many others in the faith community in calling on the Administration to immediately enact simple deportation safeguards to protect migrant lives.

Smolich is the president of the Jesuit Conference of the United States.