Migrants Stranded by Trump Decision Face Rising Hostility in Mexico

Tens of thousands of migrants from Venezuela, Guatemala and other countries are stranded in Mexico after the Trump administration shut down the asylum system at the border, increasing the pressure on a nation bracing for a wave of Mexican deportees.

Frustration had already been growing in Mexico over the number of migrants camped out in cities far from the border, trying to secure American asylum appointments through a mobile app run by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. In Mexico City, some migrants have built tent cities and slept on the streets. In a country long sympathetic to migrants, neighbors started protesting.

Now, those migrants have no clear path to the United States.

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The Mexican government has no data on how many foreigners have been waiting within its borders for their U.S. appointments. Reuters and the Associated Press, citing CBP officials, have reported that about 280,000 would-be migrants in Mexico have been trying to make appointments. A CBP spokesman said he couldn’t confirm those figures.

Since January 2023, almost 1 million people have crossed into the United States via the app, CBP One. Once asylum seekers obtained their appointment — which could take months — they could live and work in the United States while their requests were processed.

The Biden administration and the Mexican government praised the system for curtailing the practice of migrants swarming the border. But migrants then congregated in places such as Mexico City, to avoid cartel-controlled areas farther north.

The cancellation of the CBP One program comes as the Mexican government is worried about its own migrants. It is building huge shelters for its citizens who may be sent back from the United States under President Donald Trump’s “mass deportation” program. Mexico may also wind up accepting some foreign deportees — though that’s not yet confirmed.

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Mexico City was entirely unprepared for the surge of migrants over the past two years. The capital’s shelters have room for only 280 migrants; shelters run by charities can take in another 1,000, said Temístocles Villanueva, the city’s top immigration official.

About 1,700 migrants are living on the streets or in informal camps, he said.

In May, protests broke out in three neighborhoods in the capital where migrants had set up tent camps. Residents blocked major avenues, holding signs reading: “The street is not a shelter.” When the federal government announced it would open a refugee office in the upscale neighborhood of Anzures, it was met with furious demonstrations. The government backed off, moving the facility to a poor neighborhood in the south.

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The influx of migrants into Mexico City is partly due to the design of the CBP One app. Until recently, it could only be accessed by asylum seekers who had reached the capital or points farther north.

Under CBP One, American authorities provided 1,450 asylum appointments a day, through a lottery system. At Carbajal’s shelter, some people clinched an appointment within days. Others had to keep trying for months.

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President Claudia Sheinbaum has launched a crash program to prepare to receive Mexican citizens who are deported from the United States. Authorities are building dozens of shelters in northern cities. Sheinbaum said this week that businesses would open 35,000 jobs to the deportees.

But there’s no similar program for migrants stranded in Mexico. {snip}

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Huberson St Surin, 37, a Haitian who arrived in Mexico City two months ago, said there was no way he was going home. Large swaths of the Caribbean nation are overrun by gangs.

“My plan was to go to America, until Donald Trump came in and stopped the whole program,” he said with a laugh. “So now there is a new plan. Wait until Donald Trump finishes four years.”