Children from Mexico and Expanding TVPRA: Current TVPRA protections exclude children from Mexico. Mexican children have been entering through the Southwest border in numbers that mirror those of Central American children since at least 2009. Source: U.S. Customs and Border Patrol: Southwest Border Unaccompanied Alien Children cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/southwest-border-unaccompanied-children However, they are turned away at the border and sent back without the protection of having a judge evaluate their case individually. This is particularly troublesome as many of these Mexican minors are suffering from the same push factors as children from Central America. Growing gang violence from drug cartels have added to extreme poverty and political corruption, long endemic in Mexico, to push these children northward. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reported that from 2008 to 2013, the number of asylum claims filed in Mexico, Panama, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Belize increased sevenfold.2 A CNN World report from March of 2014, cites a Human Rights Watch study that found that “more than 60,000 people have been killed from 2006 to 2012.”3 A report by the UNHCR1 revealed that, of Mexican unaccompanied children interviewed by the agency, 32% of children were fleeing extreme violence from drug cartels and other crime in their hometowns and 17% of the children reported escaping abuse in their own home. Requests: The coalition asks that Congress protect the TVPRA by not curtailing any of the protections currently afforded to unaccompanied minors. If changes are made to this law, they should be to strengthen protections and ensure appropriate funds are available to vindicate the rights of these unaccompanied minors pursuant to the TVPRA in its current form. Secondly, the coalition asks Congress to expand the TVPRA so that it also applies to children coming from Mexico, and discontinue excluding child asylum seekers from Mexico from the important protections of the TVPRA. We should protect all children who seek refuge in our country.
Posted on: Wed, 24 Sep 2014 18:36:10 +0000
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