LEHIGH ACRES, Fla. — Five years ago, Alexis Llanos and his family fled Venezuela to Colombia, fleeing death threats and political persecution. The family then made plans to make the dangerous and deadly journey north through the Darien jungle, which would lead through Panama, in the hopes of eventually illegally entering the United States.
Their plans changed when a friend mentioned a new U.S. government migration program that allowed them to stay put while they argued for a chance to come legally. It worked. After a four-month process, including medical examinations and interviews with the United Nations and the US, Llanos, his partner and their seven-year-old girl and three-year-old boy arrived in Florida.
“It was a unique opportunity, a miracle that God had prepared for me,” Llanos, 27, said during an interview with The Associated Press from his new home. “I feel blessed, grateful. …I didn't want to take the risk. I wouldn't have forgiven myself if anything had happened to them because of me,” as they walked through the jungle.
The Llanos family are among the first migrants allowed into the U.S. under the Biden administration's new “safe mobility offices,” set up starting this fall in Colombia, Guatemala, Costa Rica and Ecuador. The program is designed to streamline the U.S. refugee process so that migrants don't give up and pay smugglers to make the journey north, further straining the U.S.-Mexico border, where record numbers have been crossed.
So far, 3,000 refugees have arrived in the U.S. and 9,000 have been approved. But it's a small number compared to what's happening at the U.S.-Mexico border, where there were more than 10,000 arrests for illegal crossings per day for several days in December alone. In cities such as Chicago, New York and Denver, migrants who do not have access to work permits sleep in the foyers of police stations and at airports.
These are the scenes dominating the early stages of the 2024 presidential campaign, as Republicans excoriate President Joe Biden and consider whether to oust his secretary of Homeland Security.
Republicans are also pushing the Democratic president to support more restrictive policies that would, among other things, dramatically reduce asylum protections, and they believe they can exert influence if he wants to see another injection of tens of billions in aid to Ukraine.
The Biden administration has made efforts to crack down on illegal crossings, but has also sought to widen legal routes through efforts such as the Safe Mobility Initiative, to provide alternatives for migrants hoping they don't travel north.
Those who reach the U.S.-Mexico border on foot and seek asylum will face a trial and must prove they are eligible to stay. The system is backlogged, often forcing them to wait years for a lawsuit while they sit in limbo in the U.S. without permission to work.
Under the Safe Mobility Initiative, they arrive as refugees who have already met the requirements and are legally allowed to live and work in the US. The process takes only a few months, while the more traditional screening of refugees requires years of effort. Immigrant advocates praise the new pathways, but do not think they replace asylum.
“It is absolutely critical that these routes exist now,” said Hannah Flamm, policy advisor at the International Refugee Assistance Project. But “no improvement in access to refugee resettlement can ever come at the expense of the rights of asylum seekers at the border. .”
To implement its plan, the Biden administration is working with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and the UN International Organization for Migration. To apply, migrants answer questions online to screen for eligibility, and then the U.N. agencies refer the case to the U.S., which makes the final decision. If they are denied, the government can review them for other, more temporary programs.
“This process facilitates and shortens the time” for refugees, said Luiz Fernando Godinho Santos, a UNHCR spokesman for the Americas.
Jefferson Castro, who first told Llanos about the program, also applied to come to the U.S. from Colombia after arriving from Venezuela in 2018 when he said he was threatened by police. In September, he and his wife and their two children, ages eight and four, traveled nine hours by bus from Medellín to Bogota, where U.S. officials interviewed them, gave them medical examinations and conducted American cultural immersion courses.
He knew at least three other families had been approved and assumed he would too. So he took his children out of school and sold his refrigerator, beds and motorcycle, where he used to work as a delivery boy. But they heard nothing for weeks.
“I was left without a job, without money, without answers,” Castro, 28, said in a recent telephone interview from Medellín.
At the end of December he finally received good news. They still have one hurdle: his daughter, born in Colombia, needs a passport. But he lacks the $100 to cover the costs.
“How can I have faith without working? How do I get a passport if I have no money?” Castro said. “I don't know what to do.”
Immigrant advocates say the safe mobility initiative needs work. It can be confusing, it's not well advertised so enough migrants aren't aware of it, and it's not open to enough people. For example, in Colombia, only Cubans, Haitians and Venezuelans who were present in Colombia before or on June 11 are currently eligible.
Yet they say: it is a start. And when families do make it, they are usually transferred to a non-governmental organization that helps them resettle in the US
“It's certainly a step in the right direction in terms of providing mechanisms for people to safely seek asylum, rather than having to rely on coyotes and embark on a dangerous journey,” said Lee Williams, director of programs at the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service.
Adanny Hurtado, a Venezuelan, and his family arrived in October and live in Houston. An NGO pays their rent and has helped with food and work permit paperwork. He already works as a welder. His wife is a customer assistant at Walmart and their two children are in school.
“I still can't believe it. I don't think it's real,” Hurtado said. The initiative 'was the hand God offered me'.
Still, Santos and others say it is not a comprehensive solution or a replacement for asylum. According to UNHCR projects, approximately 18.4 million people are displaced in the Western Hemisphere – it is a problem that is only growing.
Llanos, his partner, Diomaris Barboza, 26, and their children spent anxious weeks in Colombia wondering whether they would be eligible to come to the US, where they had to wait in a hotel for 10 days after their interviews.
“We didn't know the answer until the last day,” he said. The family sold their belongings and, with the help of the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, settled in Lehigh Acres, near Fort Myers.
They live in a two-bedroom house on a quiet street where they are already making friends. Lutheran services help them obtain medical examinations and all the paperwork they need to resettle, including school registration for the children. They are helped with food, money and rent, and Llanos already works in construction.
They must refund their $3,000 plane tickets. But they have three years to do it.