SAN DIEGO (Border Report) — The migrant community in shelters in Tijuana is worried over the possibility that Donald Trump could win the presidential election in November, according to José María García Lara, director of the Juventud 2000 shelter.
García Lara said asylum seekers fear that migrating to the U.S. will become almost impossible with Trump in the White House.
“The community thinks the moment he wins the presidency, the doors will close,” he said.
García Lara recalls a time in 2018 when Trump took measures to return Central American migrants to their respective countries to keep them from coming to the U.S.
“But when he lost to Biden, it was the opposite of what Trump wanted to do,” García Lara said. “He’s helped more than 50,000 migrants who were originally rejected under Trump.”
The migrant activist and shelter operator said migrants don’t understand that if Trump gets the nomination and wins the presidency, it would still take months to implement anti-migrant measures like it did after he took over for Barack Obama.
“In 2016, there was an opening for migrant communities. There were a lot of Haitians who entered the United States. Then Trump came in and automatically canceled everything, but it still took three months for his plans to go into effect before the door swung shut,” García Lara said.
During the Trump administration, Title 42 was instituted, returning most migrants to Mexico almost immediately after entering the U.S. to avoid the spread of COVID-19.
According to García Lara, migrants fear a return to these types of policies should Trump be re-elected.
“Migrants are now using the CBP One app to gain appointments and a pathway to asylum in the U.S., but they worry this program will go away with him in charge,” he said.
Two days ago, Reuters/Ipsos released the results of an online, nationwide poll conducted with 1,237 likely voters. It asked participants who they would support if Trump faced President Biden in November.
The results show 37% of those surveyed would vote for Trump, while 34% would support President Biden. Ten percent said they would vote for other candidates, while 12% planned on not voting at all. Eight percent refused to answer the question. The poll had a 2.9 percentage point margin of error.
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