Mexico's plan to take in thousands of citizens expelled from the United States is nothing short of ambitious. Plans are underway to build nine reception centers along the border – giant tents set up in parking lots, stadiums and warehouses, as well as military-run mobile kitchens.
Details of the effort, called “Mexico Hugs You,” were only revealed this week, but Mexican officials said President Donald J. Trump would carry out the largest deportation of illegal immigrants in the United States. He said he has been planning the idea for the past few months since he made the commitment. history.
Nearly every branch of government, 34 federal agencies and 16 state governments, is expected to participate in some way: busing people back to their hometowns, organizing logistics, providing medical care, and more recently. In addition to distributing cash cards worth about $100 each, the program helps those who have returned to Japan enroll them in social welfare programs such as pensions and paid training.
Officials said they are also negotiating agreements with Mexican companies to link talent and jobs.
“We are ready to welcome you on this side of the border,” Mexico's Interior Minister Rosa Isela Rodríguez said at a press conference this week. “Repatriation is an opportunity to return to your homeland and reunite with your family.”
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum called the expected mass deportations “unilateral measures” and said she disagreed with them. But as the country with the largest number of unauthorized nationals residing in the United States (an estimated 4 million people in 2022), Mexico has realized that it has an obligation to prepare.
The government's plan focuses on Mexicans expelled from the United States, but the president has indicated it may also temporarily accept foreign deportees.
Mexico is not the only country preparing. Guatemala, its neighbor to the south, also has a large number of illegal immigrants in the United States and recently announced plans to absorb its own deportees.
Mexico's foreign minister spoke by phone this week with new U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on immigration and security issues, but said Mexico and other countries in the region had not been briefed on the deportation plan by the Trump administration. Without anything concrete, they end up confused.
“With the return of Donald Trump, it has become clear once again that Mexico is unprepared to face such a scenario,” said the Mexican Coalition, a group of 23 shelters, migrant homes and organizations spread across Mexico. Sergio Luna, who works for the Immigration Defense Organization Monitoring Network, said:
“We may have the best intentions, but we cannot continue to respond to emergencies with programs that are completely inadequate,” Luna said. “This shows that for decades, Mexico has benefited from Mexican immigrants through remittances, but this population has been forgotten.”
Additionally, the government has 100 buses to bring deportees back to their home countries, many of whom fled in the first place to escape violence and lack of opportunity.
Other experts question whether Mexico's government is truly prepared to deal with the long-term trauma that deportation and family separation cause.
“These people will come back, and their return will have an impact on their mental health,” said Camelia Tigau, a migration researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
Even with new facilities, existing shelters are often small and underfunded, serving large numbers of recent arrivals in addition to regular migrants from the South hoping to cross the U.S. border. That may be difficult to provide, shelter operators said. The number of immigrants has decreased significantly in recent months.
“We can't prepare because we don't have the financial resources,” said Gabriela Hernández, director of Mexico City's Casa Tochan shelter, adding that her team relies mainly on donations from the public. “So we consider this an emergency. It's like an earthquake.”
Other shelter operators in Mexico City said they had not received any additional support from the government.
The capital, Mexico City, is expected to receive many of the returnees. Research shows that when people are deported, they often move to larger cities instead of settling in their homelands.
“It's good that the Mexican government is planning for the first intake,” said Claudia Masferal, a migration researcher who studies the dynamics and impact of U.S. returns to Mexico. Still, she added, “it's important to think about what happens in the months after that.”
Authorities plan to create new shelters and nearly triple the capacity for migrants and deportees in the capital, from about 1,300 to more than 3,000, Mexico City's head of human migration, Temistocles Villanueva, said in an interview. He said that.
As Rubio said on Tuesday, those involved in assisting immigrants and deported people would be in danger if the Trump administration halted foreign aid spending in large numbers in Mexico and other regional countries. They are also concerned that efforts to accommodate the government may be hampered. That was starting to happen following an executive order signed by Trump on Monday.
“That could lead to a crisis, or at least a temporary weakening of humanitarian networks,” Luna said.
For example, the United States is the largest funder of the United Nations' International Organization for Migration (IOM), which currently supports services provided to migrants and deportees, including hygiene kits that people receive in the event of deportation. offers a lot of. flight.
The organization, which is working with the Mexican government on the “Mexico Hugs You” program, declined to comment.
Rubio specifically mentioned foreign aid-related immigration in a cable to State Department officials on Tuesday. In the past, such aid has also gone to programs aimed at alleviating hunger, disease, and wartime suffering.
Rubio said in the cable that “mass immigration is the most critical problem of our time” and that his department would no longer take any action that would “facilitate or encourage it.”
Diplomacy, especially in the Western Hemisphere, “will prioritize protecting America's borders,” he added.
Sheinbaum suggested that Mexico may accept deportees who are not Mexican nationals. But she said the government plans to “voluntarily” return non-Mexican nationals to their home countries, including those awaiting asylum hearings in the United States.
The question of who would pay for the restitution was on the list of topics to be discussed with U.S. government officials, she said.
