WASHINGTON -- President Donald Trump's administration announced an accord Friday that would allow the United States to divert asylum seekers from the U.S. border to El Salvador, pushing migrants into one of the most dangerous countries in the world.
The deal between the two governments is the latest in a series of measures aimed at creating new layers of deterrents to the influx of migrants applying for protection on U.S. soil.
Kevin McAleenan, the acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, signed a "memorandum of understanding" with Salvadoran Foreign Minister Alexandra Hill Tinoco in Washington.
But both countries must first take necessary legal actions and implement major border security and asylum procedures before it would take place, according to a draft copy of the agreement.
McAleenan, who traveled to El Salvador for talks last month with President Nayib Bukele, praised a "shared responsibility" on migration that was part of a broader deal to accelerate economic development in Central America with the goal of keeping migrants in their home countries.
"Today we're very happy to announce the signing of this cooperative agreement between the United States and El Salvador to build protection capacity," McAleenan said, "to further our efforts for opportunities to seek protection for political, racial, religious or social groups persecution as close as possible to the origin of individuals who need it."
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McAleenan, who called the agreement "a big step forward," and Hill Tinoco discussed U.S. assistance in making El Salvador a safer and more prosperous place for its citizens. Hill Tinoco talked about ending gang violence.
"I mean, those individuals threaten people, those individuals kill people, those individuals request for the poorest and most vulnerable population to pay just to cross the street," she said, adding that her country needs more investment from the U.S. and other nations.
Condemnation from migrant and refugee advocates was swift.
"Where will they declare a haven for asylum seekers next? Syria? North Korea? This is cynical and absurd. El Salvador is in no way safe for asylum seekers," said Refugees International President Eric Schwartz.
The accord shows willingness by the Trump administration to send people to places that are known to be dangerous -- and from which people have been fleeing extreme poverty, violence and corruption -- to dissuade them from attempting a journey to the U.S. border in the first place.
One such agreement, the Migrant Protection Protocols, has sent at least 42,000 Central Americans who were seeking asylum in the United States back to dangerous Mexican border cities while they await their cases in U.S. immigration courts, a process that can take months. Though the Trump administration's agreements with Central American countries remain in an initial phase, the accords also have contributed to the perception that the border is tougher to cross. The number of migrants taken into custody along the U.S. southern border has plunged in recent months after hitting a 12-year high in May.
McAleenan called the accord with El Salvador an "asylum cooperation agreement," rather than the kind of "safe third country" arrangement Trump officials have pursued for years. That term has been stigmatized in Central America, in large part because it would be difficult to consider the Northern Triangle region of El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala as a safe haven given that it has among the highest homicide rates in the world.
"The core of it is recognizing El Salvador's development of their own asylum system and a commitment to help them build that capacity," McAleenan told reporters Friday. He said the diversion of asylum seekers from the U.S. border to El Salvador would be "one potential use of the agreement."
"Individuals crossing through El Salvador should be able to seek protections there, and we want to enforce the integrity of that process throughout the region," he said.
U.S. ASSISTANCE
In practice, though, the asylum cooperation agreement with El Salvador takes the Trump administration further toward what McAleenan is seeking across the hemisphere: deals that aim to stem the surging numbers of migrants from around the world who have flooded U.S. immigration courts with humanitarian claims.
Asylum seekers from Nicaragua, Cuba and other nations who pass through El Salvador en route to the U.S. border would be eligible for return there once the accord is implemented, U.S. officials say. As part of the plan, the United States will help build an asylum system in El Salvador and in other nations in the region, seeking to fund the effort through United Nations refugee agencies.
"We need to see whether the United States will provide El Salvador with assistance to implement the plan," said Cristobal Ramon, an immigration analyst at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington. "While El Salvador isn't receiving as many asylum seekers as the United States and Mexico, the country may not have the institutional capacity and resources to process an uptick of asylum seekers that may be sent back under the terms of the deal, which could undermine its implementation."
McAleenan reached a similar deal with Guatemala in August that has yet to be put in place, and he is also nearing a deal with Honduras, administration officials say.
Other nations where McAleenan has sought such accords, including Panama and Mexico, have balked, saying they will not sign safe third country agreements even as they demonstrate a willingness to reach deals that could function in a similar way.
The Trump administration earlier this year threatened to withhold all federal assistance to El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras unless they did more to end the migrant crisis.
The move was met by stiff resistance in Congress as experts had said the cuts would likely only exacerbate the number of migrants seeking to make the hazardous journey to the U.S. because of a further lack of resources.
Bukele, 38, a centrist businessman and former mayor of San Salvador, has sought to leverage his cooperation with the United States to obtain benefits from the Trump administration. They include additional U.S. investment as well as a potential fix for the roughly 200,000 Salvadorans who have been living in the United States for nearly 20 years with a form of provisional residency known as temporary protected status.
The Trump administration's attempts to end temporary protected status for El Salvador and other nations have been blocked in court, and the current extension is valid through January.
A temporary protected status deal has been included in the discussions, U.S. officials say, but McAleenan made no announcement on the topic Friday, even as Hill Tinoco, the Salvadoran foreign minister, spoke in urgent terms about the need for a resolution.
"There are other measures we are working on to find a permanent solution" for temporary protected status holders in the United States, Hill Tinoco said, noting those Salvadorans are the parents of an estimated 200,000 U.S. citizen children. "They're a people that put their hand on their heart to sing the national anthem of the United States and put their hand on their heart to sing the national anthem of El Salvador. They are hard working and they are rooted within the United States of America."
The asylum accord would not send Salvadorans back to their country if they reach the U.S. border seeking protection, though they could be routed to Guatemala if that deal takes effect.
McAleenan has emphasized that the United States will implement the asylum agreements carefully to avoid overwhelming receiver nations with a flood of people needing resettlement.
Gang violence has pushed El Salvador's homicide rate to one of the world's highest this decade, but in recent years the level of violence has dropped. According to the latest Salvadoran figures, the murder rate has fallen by half since last year, which the government attributes to its military crackdown on gangs.
Irregular migration from El Salvador also has declined significantly in recent years, and U.S. agents now arrest far more Hondurans and Guatemalans at the U.S. border, according to the latest data.
Information for this article was contributed by Nick Miroff, Kevin Sieff and Maria Sacchetti of The Washington Post; and by Colleen Long, Astrid Galvan, Elliot Spagat, Michael Balsamo, Luis Alonzo Lugo and Zeke Miller of The Associated Press.
A Section on 09/21/2019