Local Opinion: Border closures harm those we're supposed to protect

Ever since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic two years ago, migrants who flee their countries and request asylum at the U.S. southern border have been forced to wait in Mexico without any process whatsoever.

Now, as Arizona loosens COVID-19 restrictions, it’s time to remove this obscure health law known as Title 42. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) agrees that asylum seekers pose little risk of spreading the coronavirus. In fact, Title 42 is causing its own kind of public health crisis. It’s why we must restore our decades-long asylum policy allowing vulnerable people to make the case for safe haven in America.

I lead a team of six legal staff in Nogales and have seen this policy’s terrible toll on hundreds of families who are stuck there. Many people have been waiting in agonizing limbo — often up to a year — to enter the U.S. and begin their asylum cases. They’re vulnerable to abuse and organized crime; my clients have shared disturbing reports of rape, physical assault, torture, extortion and kidnappings.

The CDC planned to end Title 42 later this month, yet Arizona is one of 20 states that would keep this harmful policy. U.S. Sens. Mark Kelly and Krysten Sinema and gubernatorial candidate Katie Hobbs have all expressed concern that removing the policy will increase the flow of migrants to the border and overwhelm our system. We need better resources and funding to process people at the border. But Title 42 has, itself, created this overcrowding. The road is unnecessarily blocked so nobody can move. Only in this traffic jam, people are dying while stuck.

Fearful politicians cite reports saying the number of border apprehensions has increased. In fact, apprehensions are up because of Title 42. During the first nine months of fiscal year 2021, for example, Border Patrol apprehended 1.1 million people, but more than one-third had been taken into custody within the previous year. Our clients report being summarily denied access to safety at ports of entry, and so they continued to cross irregularly out of desperation.

Even more troubling is the fact that Title 42 unnecessarily pushes these repeat crossers into dangerous situations. It’s a natural reaction. If you were desperate for safety and stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic — perhaps running out of food and water — you and your family might get out of the car and try to walk. But in this case, people risk their lives trying to find alternate routes, such as crossing in the desert heat. Last year, at least 650 people died trying to cross the border. If people could safely seek asylum at ports of entry, they wouldn’t try to repeatedly cross elsewhere.

I’m calling on our leaders to reconsider their support of this inhumane policy. Rather than trying to stem the flow of migration under the faulty guise of a public health policy, I urge policymakers to improve the asylum system we already have in place. Resuming asylum processing at ports of entry will reduce the number trying to cross the border, protect more lives and comply with our legal obligations.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas recently pledged to increase the government’s capacity to evaluate new asylum requests. In addition, we should boost staffing and resources to nonprofits that provide legal and humanitarian support to asylum seekers. My organization, the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project, as well as other nonprofits in Arizona have expertise in receiving asylum seekers and will continue to work closely with federal, state and municipal governments to make the Arizona border an orderly, humane and efficient place for both asylum seekers and border communities.

Our nation has a moral and legal obligation to offer a functional asylum process. Let’s support one that actually serves the desperate people it was designed to.