Biden creating new restrictions to stop migrants from seeking asylum at U.S. border

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Biden creating new restrictions to stop migrants from seeking asylum at U.S. border

Migrants caught illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border could be denied the chance to claim asylum and quickly deported or turned back to Mexico under new restrictions announced on Tuesday, part of a sweeping enforcement effort by U.S. President Joe Biden.

The new measures will take effect immediately and will have exceptions for unaccompanied children, people who face serious medical or safety threats and victims of trafficking.

“This action will help us regain control of our border and restore order to the process,” Biden said during a White House briefing on Tuesday.

“We must face a simple truth: to protect America as a land that welcomes immigrants, we must first secure the border and secure it now … if the United States doesn’t secure our border, there’s no limit to the number of people who may try to come here.”

Biden, a Democrat, has toughened his approach to border security as immigration has emerged as a top issue for Americans in the run-up to Nov. 5 elections, where he will likely face Republican Donald Trump in a rematch of the 2020 contest.

The new asylum restrictions are not permanent, Biden said. They are activated when the daily average of border arrests tops 2,500 over a week and will be paused when arrests drop below 1,500 per day, according to a White House official.

Dozens of men line up in front of a border patrol agent dressed in a green uniform.
Migrants from Jordan, China, Egypt and Colombia surrender to a border patrol agent after crossing into the U.S. from Mexico in Jacumba Hot Springs, Calif., on May 15. (Adrees Latif/Reuters)

The deterrent measures “will significantly increase consequences for those who cross the southern border unlawfully,” the official said, requesting anonymity as a condition of an earlier call ahead of Biden’s briefing.

Key operational questions about how the new measures will be implemented remained unclear, however, including how the administration would quickly deport migrants from far-away and unco-operative countries and how many non-Mexican migrants Mexico would accept under the new enforcement regime.

Trump vows crackdown if re-elected

Biden took office in 2021 vowing to reverse some of Trump’s restrictive immigration policies but grappled with record levels of migrants caught crossing illegally, a trend that has strained U.S. border authorities and cities receiving new arrivals.

Trump has criticized Biden for rolling back his policies and vowed a wide-ranging crackdown if re-elected.

The new restrictions resemble similar policies implemented by Trump and use a legal statute known as 212(f) that served as the underpinning for Trump’s travel bans blocking people from several majority-Muslim nations and other countries.

The new restrictions are expected to trigger legal challenges from immigrant and civil rights groups who have criticized Biden for adopting Trump-like policies and backtracking on U.S. legal obligations to asylum seekers.

In advance of the announcement, Trump’s campaign issued a statement criticizing Biden for high levels of illegal immigration and said the move to exempt unaccompanied minors would encourage child trafficking.

Mexico’s president to speak with Biden

Biden has pushed unsuccessfully for months to pass a Senate bill that would toughen border security, including with a provision that resembles his latest moves by executive action. The bill was crafted by a bipartisan group of senators but Republicans rejected it after Trump came out in opposition.

“Frankly, I would’ve preferred to address this issue through bipartisan legislation … but Republicans left me no choice [but to use executive power],” Biden said.

“For those who say the steps I’ve taken are too strict, I say be patient,” Biden later added. “Doing nothing is not an option. We have to act.”

The number of migrants caught crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally dropped in recent months, a trend U.S. officials partly attribute to increased Mexican enforcement.

Claudia Sheinbaum was elected as Mexico’s first female president in a landslide victory on Sunday and will take office on Oct. 1. Biden’s border restrictions could put pressure on Sheinbaum, the successor to current President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, to keep illegal border crossings down.

Lopez Obrador said at a daily news conference that he expected to speak with Biden over the phone as soon as Tuesday and that the countries “have been making good progress” on the issue of immigration.

Under the new measures, migrants who demonstrate a fear of being returned to their home countries will be screened for other types of humanitarian protection but could be deported if denied, the Biden official told reporters. Those who are removed will face at least a five-year ban on re-entry and potential criminal prosecution.

“These steps will strengthen the asylum system, preventing it from being overwhelmed and backed up by those who do not have legitimate claims,” the official said.

The Biden administration has taken a number of steps over the past year to toughen the asylum process, including issuing a regulation in May 2023 that heightened the standard for an initial asylum claim.

Biden officials have said the effectiveness of U.S. enforcement is limited by a lack of resources in the absence of more funding from Congress.

Published at Tue, 04 Jun 2024 17:54:46 +0000

Coastal erosion threatens to wash away D-Day beaches

Visitors pepper the length of Utah Beach in Normandy, France, some pausing to take photos, others simply staring out across the English Channel. 

One passerby in a bright orange windbreaker stops to scoop a handful of sand into a plastic bag and tucks it into his satchel. 

“Dad always wanted to come back. He just never had the chance” another man said.

Nearby, a mother and daughter crouch down and run their hands across the powder-smooth surface, then photograph the mark they’ve left.

The hallowed beaches of the D-Day invasion on June 6, 1944, are one of the main attractions for the thousands who are making the pilgrimage to the coast of northern France to celebrate the 80th anniversary of its liberation from the Nazis. 

Nearly 150,000 Allied troops landed or parachuted into the invasion area that day, including more than 14,000 Canadians. Of those Canadians, 381 were killed, 584 were wounded, and 131 were captured.

But those who wish to pay their respects to the sacrifices made along that coastline in 1944 are doing so on borrowed time. As a result of coastal erosion, some of the beaches of D-Day are disappearing.

Two-thirds of the coast is already eroding, according to a 2023 report from the Normandy Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which is composed of regional specialists and scientists. 

A closeup image of sand on a beach.
Two-thirds of the Normandy coast is eroding, according to a 2023 report from the Normandy Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which is composed of 23 regional specialists and scientists. (Lauren Sproule/CBC)

The report from the Normandy IPCC, which explores the local consequences of climate change, also mentions flooding concerns. It references a 2020 study by the national statistics bureau of France (INSEE), which reveals more than 122,000 residents and 54,000 jobs are “threatened by this marine flooding hazard.” 

There’s also concern about the future of the monuments, museums, and memorabilia that adorn the beaches where the allies landed during the Second World War in 1944. The Normandy tourism office lists 124 places of remembrance across the region, the majority of which are near the coast.

Grappling with solutions

Xavier Michel, an assistant professor of geography at the University of Caen Normandy, has led research focused on social perceptions of D-Day sites in the context of climate change. 

He found sentimental attachment to the beaches was a common response. 

“Some people told us the emotion regarding this place comes from this unique location,” he said.  

“It wouldn’t be possible to recreate it in the same way, the same link between visitors and heritage.”

A man stands on a beach.
Xavier Michel, an assistant professor of geography at the University of Caen Normandy, said his research has found the beaches create an important link between between visitors and history. (Lauren Sproule/CBC)

Michel said some possible solutions to the erosion include reinforcing the beaches, relocating museums and monuments away from the coast, and for those residents whose well-being is at risk, moving away altogether.

Michel de Vallavielle, mayor of Sainte-Marie-du-Mont, the small community crowned by Utah Beach, says efforts are being made to bolster the beach. They include keeping tourists off the dunes and planting d’oyats, a type of European beach grass that helps slow water flow and binds the sand together.

De Vallavieille’s own roots in the area run deep. His father was accidentally shot by American paratroopers during the landings and went on to open the local D-Day museum in 1962.

“If it disappears, part of the story disappears,” he said of the beaches.

Erosion hits D-Day beaches

22 hours ago

Duration 2:06

Because of erosion along the French coast, some of the beaches that were central to the D-Day landings in 1944 are disappearing — threatening one of the main attractions for the thousands who are making the pilgrimage for this month’s 80th anniversary.

The Utah Beach Landing Museum, which appears to rise out of the sand like a Second World War bunker, marks one of five landing sites along the coast and the first of the invasion. 

Sitting atop a compromised dune, marked by a crude wire fence designed to keep visitors away, the museum is secure for now. But one of its American sister sites, the Pointe du Hoc Ranger Monument, is perched upon a crumbling cliff face that has suffered numerous landslides as a result of natural erosion.

Protecting the past

The most recent landslide in November 2023 forced the closure of one of the U.S. site’s bunkers because it fell within the 20-metre required safety zone imposed by the American Battle Monuments Commission, according to Supt. Scott Desjardins. 

“We want to welcome visitors in the safest way possible and in a manner that also ensures the preservation of this historic site,” Desjardins told the CBC in an emailed statement.

A further 40 kilometres along the coast, at Juno Beach, the site of the Canadian landing, the threat is not as imminent, says Juno Beach Centre director Nathalie Worthington.

“We are lucky because the dune is gaining on the sea,” she said, pointing to a bunker that was once lapped at by the Channel’s waves and is now buffered by a sandy beach.

“The threat is not as important as in other places on the coast. But we are surrounded by 300 degrees of water. We’ve got the sea, we’ve got the harbour and we’ve got a river.” 

A statue on a beach.
Juno Beach, the site of the Canadian landing on D-Day, is not under imminent threat, But Juno Beach Centre director Nathalie Worthington said it’s only a matter of time before the centre and its monuments, such as this memorial sculpture by Canadian artist Colin Gibson, are flooded. (Lauren Sproule/CBC)

It is not a question of if the Juno Beach Centre and all its monuments will be flooded, but when, she said.

Worthington says they are “doing their share” to fight the effects of climate change, such as reducing carbon emissions by limiting waste and promoting low-carbon transportation options to visitors.

She says the fight she says is not too dissimilar from the one taken up by the Allied forces 80 years earlier on the very same beach.

“In 1944, the soldiers who came here, they came to fight for peace and freedom and against dictators,” she said. 

“What is the main threat to democracy and peace in the world today if not climate change?” 

French authorities are expecting one million people to attend D-Day commemorations throughout the region this week. Veterans and school children alike will gather on the shifting sands of Normandy’s beaches to honour both the personal and inherited memories of June 6, 1944, a ritual that may outlive the beaches themselves.

Published at Tue, 04 Jun 2024 13:20:57 +0000

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