El Paso stops busing migrants to northern states as Venezuelans are sent to Mexico 

The City of El Paso plans to stop busing migrants to northern states after the Biden administration announced a policy change to send asylum-seeking Venezuelans to Mexico if caught at the border. 

“We realize that we won’t need the charters, so at the point, we will start handling it differently,” D’Agostino said. said El Paso Deputy City Manager Mario D’Agostino. 

On October 12, the Biden administration agreed to send Venezuelan migrants caught at the migrants to Mexico under Title 42, a Trump-era policy that allows border officials to quickly deny entry to migrants to prevent the spread of Covid-19. 

In Mexico, Venezuelan asylum-seekers can apply for entry to the U.S. under a humanitarian parole program, which will allow thousands of Venezuelans to enter the country legally and secure work authorization for two years. 

El Paso had been receiving a record-breaking number of 2,100 Venezuelan migrants a day, which would stay in El Paso until their asylum claims were processed.  

To help deal with the overcrowded shelters in the city and the dozens of people that had set up makeshift shelters on the city’s streets, El Paso was sending nine to 14 buses of migrants every day to cities such as New York City and Chicago.

The city has sent a total of 292 buses, carrying almost 14,000 migrants. Since Biden announced the new expulsion policy, El Paso reduced the number of buses to four to eight per day. On Thursday, the city sent its last two buses. 

“Due to the new policy action for Venezuelans taken last week by the Department of Homeland Security, (U.S. Customs and Border Protection) discontinued sending migrants to the city this week because of a significant decrease in encounters. Two charters departed today for the remaining unsponsored migrants in local shelters as well as our hotel shelter operations,” city spokeswoman Laura Cruz-Acosta said.