President Joe Biden and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador pledged Friday to work side-by-side to confront illicit fentanyl trafficking into the U.S. and to manage the growing number of migrants traveling north to the border between their nation.
Quick Read
- Presidents Joe Biden and Andrés Manuel López Obrador pledged to collaborate in combating illicit fentanyl trafficking into the U.S. and managing the growing number of migrants traveling to the U.S.-Mexico border.
- Biden expressed confidence in their partnership, despite previous tensions over issues like fentanyl production and the killing of journalists.
- López Obrador had previously shown his willingness to snub Biden, skipping a summit over non-inclusion of certain countries.
- Both leaders were positive in their public interactions, with mutual compliments.
- They met in San Francisco during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference.
- Discussions focused on migration issues and the rising number of southern border crossings.
- Fentanyl trafficking was a key topic, especially following Biden’s agreement with China’s President Xi Jinping to curb the opioid’s trafficking.
- The U.S. faces challenges with fentanyl, primarily sourced from China and Mexico, contributing to over 100,000 drug overdose deaths annually in the U.S.
- Migration challenges are growing, with bipartisan calls for federal assistance to manage the situation at the border.
- Biden’s request for $14 billion in border security funding was not included in a recent temporary spending bill.
- The U.S. and Mexico have collaborated on immigration policies, including Mexico agreeing to accept certain migrants turned away at the border.
- Asylum-seekers in Mexico, especially from Haiti, are increasing.
- The U.S. is accepting 30,000 people per month from four specific countries under certain conditions.
- Guatemala and Colombia are setting up regional asylum hubs, but Mexico has not agreed to host one.
- López Obrador also planned to discuss U.S.-Cuba relations and sanctions with Biden.
The Associated Press has the story:
Biden and López Obrador talked fentanyl and US-Mexico migration
Newslooks- SAN FRANCISCO (AP)
President Joe Biden and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador pledged Friday to work side-by-side to confront illicit fentanyl trafficking into the U.S. and to manage the growing number of migrants traveling north to the border between their nation.
“Nothing is beyond our reach in my view if Mexico and the United States stand together and work together,” Biden said.
Biden’s relationship with López Obrador has at times been tense, in part because of Biden’s willingness to criticize Mexico on topics such as fentanyl production and the killing of journalists. And López Obrador isn’t afraid to snub the U.S. leader. He skipped a Los Angeles summit last year where leaders tackled the issue of migration because the U.S. didn’t invite Cuba, Nicaragua or Venezuela. He also initially said he would skip this year’s APEC conference, but changed his mind.
The two men were all smiles and compliments before the press on Friday, with Biden telling López Obrador: “I couldn’t have a better partner than you,” and the Mexican leader calling Biden a “good man” and an “extraordinary president.”
They were in San Francisco for the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference, where Biden has held a series of face-to-face meetings with other leaders, including China’s President Xi Jinping and the leaders of Japan and South Korea, as he seeks to reassure the region that the U.S. and China are competitors, not zero-sum rivals.
Biden and Lopez Obrador set to work talking migration as the U.S. strains to manage a rising number of southern border crossings.
They also discussed deadly fentanyl trafficking, particularly after Biden secured an agreement with Xi to curb the illicit opioid. Mexico and China are the primary sources for synthetic fentanyl trafficked into the U.S. Nearly all the chemicals needed to make it come from China, and the drugs are then mass-produced in Mexico and trafficked via cartels into the U.S.
The issues of fentanyl and immigration are related. Human smuggling over the border is a part of cartel operations that also include drug trafficking into the U.S.
“We’re working side-by-side to combat organized crime,” Biden said.
The powerful opioid is the deadliest drug in the U.S. today. More than 100,000 deaths a year have been linked to drug overdoses since 2020 and about two-thirds of those are related to fentanyl. The annual death toll is more than 10 times the level in 1988, at the height of the crack epidemic.
“We’re aware of the damage it poses to the United states youth,” López Obrador said through an interpreter.
And migration challenges facing the U.S. are growing increasingly intractable. Democratic leaders at the state and local level are begging for federal assistance to help care for migrant families living in squalid shelters and sleeping in police stations. Republicans are loudly critical of Biden’s border policies as too lax. And Congress has not passed an immigration overhaul in decades.
Biden asked for $14 billion from Congress for border security but the temporary spending bill he just signed did not have funding for the border, Ukraine aid or Israel.
There are rising numbers of migrants at the border. Arrests for illegal crossings along the U.S.-Mexico line were up 21% to 218,763 in September, and Biden has repeatedly said Congress should act to fix outdated immigration laws. But in the meantime, his administration has developed policies that aim to deter migrants from making a dangerous and often deadly journey while also opening up new legal immigration pathways.
Mexico’s support is critical to any push by the U.S. to clamp down at the southern border, particularly as migrants from nations as far away as Haiti are making the trek on foot up through Mexico and are not easily sent back to their home countries.
López Obrador said the administration’s policies of cracking down on illegal crossings while opening up other legal pathways for others to come to the U.S. lawfully was “a humane way to address the migration phenomenon.”
Earlier this year, Mexico agreed to continue to accept migrants from Venezuela, Haiti, Cuba and Nicaragua who are turned away at the border, and up to 100,000 people from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador who have family in the U.S. will be eligible to live and work there.
According to data on asylum-seekers in Mexico, people from Haiti remained at the top with 18,860 so far this year, higher than the total for the whole of 2022.
Meanwhile, the U.S. is accepting 30,000 people per month from the four countries for two years and offering them the ability to work, as long as they come legally, have eligible sponsors and pass vetting and background checks.
Guatemala and Colombia will open regional hubs where people can go to make asylum claims in the hope of stopping them from traveling on foot. But Mexico has so far refused to allow the U.S. to set one up.
López Obrador said earlier that he would also use Friday’s meeting with Biden to take up the case for Cuba and would urge his U.S. counterpart to resume a dialogue with the island nation and end U.S. sanctions.
