New York: As the US has intensified its campaign of rounding up illegal migrants and deporting them on military planes, it overcame opposition from Colombia with threats of tariffs in a preview of how President Donald Trump will enforce his campaign promise.
After Colombia refused to let two aircraft carrying its nationals apprehended in the US as illegal migrants land, Trump announced on Truth Social on Sunday afternoon a 25 per cent tariff on imports from that country, which, he threatened, would double in a week.
However, by Sunday night, Colombia’s resistance crumbled, and the White House said it had agreed to “unrestricted acceptance of all illegal aliens from Colombia” including those coming on military planes.
In a show of force on Sunday, federal agents fanned out across the US rounding up criminal illegal migrants.
Trump had promised mass deporations in his Day 1 agenda, but the logistical impossibility of rounding up millions of people has made his administration moderate it by prioritising those who had committed crimes, reinvigorating enforcement of laws that were followed tepidly.
Brazil, meanwhile, protested the handcuffing of deportees who arrived there on US planes calling it “degrading treatment”.
Mexico temporarily refused to let US military planes carrying deportees land last week, but quickly rescinded the orders and let them back in.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, “It is the responsibility of each nation to take back their citizens who are illegally present in the United States in a serious and expeditious manner”. After a meeting between Rubio and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Tuesday, the US said that they had discussed “irregular migration” and the minister said that India was open to taking back illegal migrants.
Reports said that about 20,000 Indians would be taken back.
While that meshes with Trump’s goal of ridding the country of illegal migrants, it also deals with India’s concern over Indian criminal gangs and extremists operating from the US.
There are an estimated 11 million illegal migrants in the US and, according to the Pew Research Centre about 725,000 of them are Indians. The rounding up of illegal immigrants, particularly those with criminal histories, has been ongoing, even under former President Joe Biden, but has been reinvigorated with a dash of publicity after President Trump declared a national emergency over illegal migration last Monday after he was sworn in. On Sunday, Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove said that several federal agencies were being deployed to help the Department of Homeland Security in roundng up illegal migrants in order to “secure the border, stop this invasion”. (IANS)
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