Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has said that he will help the U.S. deal with the current migrant crisis but has placed several conditions on his assistance, demanding $20 billion in aid to Latin American countries, along with legal status for 10 million Hispanic individuals who are currently in the U.S.
Lopez Obrador’s demands come after a meeting last month with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas that failed to reach an agreement on how to proceed.
The Mexican president confirmed that American officials asked Mexico to take measures to block migrants at the country’s southern border with Guatemala or make it harder for migrants to make their way across Mexico in buses, trucks and trains. However, he wants the U.S. to send development aid to the home countries of migrants and get rid of the sanctions that are currently in place against Venezuela and Cuba.
He said: “Mexico is helping reach agreements with other countries, in this case Venezuela.”
“We also want something done about the (U.S.) differences with Cuba,” López Obrador added. “We have already proposed to President Biden that a U.S.-Cuba bilateral dialogue be opened.”
Lopez Obrador has been a staunch opponent of America’s sanctions against Cuba, which is also a source of migrants at the American border.
Speaking to NBC News, a senior Biden administration official said that Lopez Obrador “has a very ambitious agenda. For some of these things, we would need Congress to act. We share the vision that we need to lift up the region.”
The U.S. and Mexico will discuss the matter further later this month in Washington, D.C. As Biden heads into his re-election campaign, the border crisis will be a key factor; it is already having a negative effect on his polling numbers, and his team is hoping cooperation from Mexico will help him improve his standing.
In addition to financial aid for policing borders, Mexico is also asking the U.S. to help address the root causes of migration through investments in programs to help people in Central and South America get out of poverty.
Border crisis deepened in November and December, data shows
Mexico is feeling the pressure after two railroad crossings had to be closed in Texas last month because the American personnel working there had to be redeployed to deal with the overwhelming surge of migrants making illegal border crossings. According to Mexico, these closures damaged trade. The two crossings were reopened after significant backlash, but other closures, such as the border crossing in Lukeville, Arizona, remained in place longer so officials could be reassigned to other posts to help process the surge of migrants.
In November, U.S. Border Control arrested more than 191,000 people for illegally crossing the border from Mexico; this amounts to a daily average of 6,370 and marked the fourth monthly increase since July.
The November arrests were largely Mexicans, followed by people from Guatemala, Venezuela, Honduras and Colombia.
December, meanwhile, saw a record 300,000 migrants processed by Customs and Border Protection. More than 10 million illegal crossings have been seen since President Biden took office.
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