The White House says Mexico is taking new steps to
curb the number of migrants crossing the southern border.
Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro
Mayorkas were in Mexico City yesterday meeting with the country's
president about the issue.
Those talks came as officials expect thousands more to soon
reach the border.
This as a new caravan of migrants heads N toward
the USCBS News correspondent Skyler Henry is traveling with President
Biden in the US Virgin Islands and joins us now
with more on this. Skyler,
thanks so much for being here.
Want to ask about how these two governments are approaching
this issue of border security,
especially following those talks yesterday?
Yeah. So we know that these two sides will now
commit to what they were calling a working group.
They'll reconvene next month where they will continue to talk
about ways to move forward to again try to stem
this migrant crisis in and of itself.
We know that the meeting yesterday was an amicable one.
Mexico's president put out on social media
that there was an important meeting
and it's important for neighbor policy to be created,
but also talked about important agreements that have been reached
as well.
Nothing to roll out yet in terms of new initiatives,
but obviously good to see that both sides
are doing what they can to try to address this
issue as quickly as they possibly can.
We know that, as you pointed out,
the Secretary of State, along with the Homeland Security Secretary
and Homeland Security Advisor
Luce Sherwood Randall, all met with Mexican officials to talk
about what they can possibly do to not only deal
with the migrant issue and the security issue that comes
with this, but also some framework surrounding an economic policy
to try to deal with this issue
in and of itself. We know that
Mexico's president has floated in the past the possibility of
the US putting out some developmental aid to try to
get to those
home countries where a large number of these migrants are
coming from.
They're also considered the possibility of
easing of sanctions. Specifically speaking on Cuba and Venezuela,
that is where a lot of these migrants are coming
from as well.
So again, we'll see what happens when the two sides
meet again next month.
So, Scott, the spike in migration is really straining resources
here in this country.
I wonder how federal and local officials are handling this
problem.
Yeah. Well, if you take
a look at what has happened in recent weeks,
particularly along the border, we know that officials have closed
off several rail and road access points into the southern
part of the United States in an effort to try
to stem this problem in and of itself,
as a large number of migrants have
hopped onto several rail lines to try to get
into the country. We know that we saw this and
in several points throughout Texas,
El Paso being one of them as well.
We know that officials say that this is not only
a migration problem, but this is also starting to become
something that is impacting the country economically.
As well as several of these access points that have
been closed off account for some
45% of direct rail consumer lines between the US and
several of its trade partners.
And so officials are looking to try to
open up these lines as quickly as possible,
but again try to figure out how to mitigate
this issue in and of itself.
We know that Customs and Border security agents have said
that they are trying to
get more resources talking about how strained they have been
over the course of the last year.
Just seeing these large numbers saying that they are not
equipped personnel wise and they are looking for more supplemental
aid to try to get additional border agents on the
ground to try to help with this problem as quickly
as they can.
But they are expecting thousands more migrants to head to
that border
in the months to come.
Skyler, Henry, thanks so much.