The Biden administration on Friday carried out its first fast-track deportation flights to Central America, but many families were abruptly removed from passenger manifests after testing positive for coronavirus or having been exposed to an infected person, according to Department of Homeland Security officials.
Biden officials announced Monday they planned to resume “expedited removal” flights following another sharp increase this month in the number of Central American families crossing into the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas. The explosive spread of the virus’s delta variant in Texas and along the southern U.S. border has intensified pressure on the administration to ramp up enforcement.
Two deportation flights operated by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement departed Brownsville, Tex., with 73 family members, according to DHS officials, far fewer than the 147 adults and children who were originally slated to travel.
“The expedited removal process is a lawful means to securely manage our border, and it is a step toward our broader aim to realize safe and orderly immigration processing,” DHS said in a statement.
ICE filled most of the open seats with single adult migrants who tested negative for the coronavirus, said the officials, who were not authorized to discuss details of the flights. One plane went to Guatemala and the other to Honduras and El Salvador.
Authorities carried out the deportations using a procedure known as Electronic Nationality Verification that allows them to determine migrants’ country of origin through biometric information-sharing programs. The procedure, also known as “no-doc flights,” allows ICE to deport migrants who cross the border without passports or identification.
Since the pandemic began, border authorities have relied on an emergency public health law known as Title 42 to quickly return most Central American migrants to Mexico. The Biden administration has declined to use Title 42 to return unaccompanied minors, who have arrived in record numbers this year. The percentage of families being sent to Mexico each month has steadily declined in recent months, but Biden officials continue to use the authority to expel most single adult migrants.
Immigrant advocates say the Title 42 expulsions deny migrants their legal right to seek asylum in the United States, but the Biden administration’s preparations to end it have been stalled by the rising number of infections in Mexico and many U.S. states. Health officials in Texas reported more than 10,000 new daily cases this week, the most since early February.
“Asylum and other legal migration pathways should be readily available to those who need them, and this Administration is committed to fairly and efficiently considering asylum claims,” the DHS statement said. “Consistent with that approach, the Department of Homeland Security today resumed expedited removal flights for certain families who recently arrived at the southern border, cannot be expelled under Title 42, and do not have a legal basis to stay in the United States.”
moar here -
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/biden-deportation-flights-covid/2021/07/30/fcead208-f154-11eb-ab6f-b41a066381df_story.html