Mexico Can't Help U.S. with Migrants 'Forever,' Must Invest in 'Poor Countries': President

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said his country can't help the United States with migrants "forever" and that there must be investments in "poor countries" such as in Central America where many migrants come from, the Associated Press reported.

López Obrador's comments came after the reinstatement of the U.S. "Remain in Mexico" policy of sending asylum seekers back to Mexico, established under the Trump administration. ...

...The U.S. Supreme Court refused Tuesday to block a lower court ruling ordering the administration of President Joe Biden to reinstate the Trump-era policy of forcing people to wait in Mexico for hearings on asylum claims.

Roberto Velasco, Mexico's director for North American affairs, said Wednesday the court ruling is not binding on Mexico. He stressed that Mexico's "immigration policy is designed and executed in a sovereign manner."....

https://www.wola.org/analysis/whats-in-the-billion-dollar-aid-request-for-central-america-2/

What’s in the 2015 Billion-Dollar Aid Request for Central America?
by Adam Isacson

THE PROPOSED AID PACKAGE WOULD MOSTLY BENEFIT CIVILIAN INSTITUTIONS OVER “DRUG WAR” PRIORITIES. HERE’S HOW IT BREAKS DOWN:
On February 2, the State Department sent to Congress more details about its big request for US$1 billion in 2016 assistance to Central America, as part of next year’s foreign aid budget proposal. Compared to 2014, this $1 billion package would mean a tripling of foreign aid budget assistance to the region, especially to the three “Northern Triangle” countries (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras), which suffer very high violent crime levels.

The proposed new aid comes in response to the 2014 wave of unaccompanied minors fleeing violence from their home countries, in which 51,705 children from the Northern Triangle region, and 61,334 members of families with children, crossed the U.S. border.

The document submitted to Congress this week looks like a great improvement over past big U.S. aid packages to Latin America, which directed the vast majority of assistance to military and police forces, and which prioritized drug interdiction and the drug war over strengthening public security institutions. That was the case with “Plan Colombia” (2000–2006, 81 percent military/police aid) and the initial years of the “Mérida Initiative” for Mexico (2008–2010, 78 percent).

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The majority of the aid in this proposal—at least 80 percent—goes to civilian institutions, civil society, and economic development, in recognition of the need to address the root causes underlying the violence and lack of opportunity driving migration. Further details about the aid will certainly reveal this to be a less-than-perfect package, but in broad strokes it represents an important shift: it seeks to address the full range of causes, instead of treating security cooperation as the central element. It recognizes that many institutions must be strengthened if Central America’s Northern Triangle countries are truly to protect their citizens.

Here is how the aid request breaks down. Some figures are approximate—details about the aid proposal are still not very granular—but are unlikely to be off by more than 1 percent.

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Let’s walk through each aid program.

Development Assistance (DA)

This program sees the sharpest increase, making up more than half of the proposed aid package all by itself. Administered by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), DA funds anti-poverty, economic growth, and institution-building programs.

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According to the aid request and a fact sheet from the Vice President’s Office, much DA would aim to improve the business climate for private-sector job creation in Central America. Priorities include trade promotion aid, energy development, literacy and vocational education, job programs for at-risk youth, and improvements to governments’ provision of basic services. It will be critical that private-sector “job-creation” aid in this category truly reaches the most vulnerable populations, rather than benefiting elites without trickling down.

Economic Support Fund (ESF)

Also administered by USAID, ESF is a more flexible economic aid program, allowing for assistance in amounts that cannot be justified for development purposes alone. ESF has funded a portion of the Central American Regional Security Initiative (CARSI), a series of programs that, since 2008, have sought to address the region’s citizen security crisis. (CARSI’s impact has been small: in 2014 its $161 million were spread across dozens of programs in seven Central American countries.) The aid request would assign about 20 percent of resources to ESF, tripling this account over 2014 levels.

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This is our fuzziest estimate: the aid proposal’s narrative suggests that nearly all of the account’s greatly increased “Western Hemisphere Regional” fund would go to Central America, but the corresponding table does not fully specify that.

ESF would support “rule of law institutions to better administer justice, ensure due process, and protect human rights,” and “support regional economic growth assistance to improve income opportunities.” This aid account would pay for community-level violence prevention programs, including “working with faith-based organizations to provide at-risk youth with life skills, job training, and recreation activities; supporting civic groups to reclaim gang-controlled public spaces and improve basic infrastructure, such as street lights; and providing services at domestic violence assistance centers.”

Global Health Programs

A smaller amount of economic aid would go through separate child and maternal health and disease-prevention programs administered by the State Department and USAID. This amount is largely unchanged from 2014.

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International Narcotics and Law Enforcement (INCLE)

Carried out by the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs, INCLE is the only program that can pay for both military/police and economic/institution-building aid. It has made up the majority of CARSI, paying for efforts ranging from vetted anti-drug units and model community police precincts to civilian judicial reform and anti-corruption programs.

The 2016 proposal would more than double INCLE assistance. No public accounting currently exists of how this program is distributing resources across countries, or across its disparate range of priorities.

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The aid request explains that INCLE would pay for an “extension of Model Police Precincts; in-service training and capacity enhancements of law enforcement personnel including anti-gang and transnational crime task forces; strengthening security and justice institutions to address transnational crime through joint police-prosecutor task forces; land border and maritime interdiction; regional aviation; and efforts to combat impunity. Increased emphasis will also be given to activities that support civil society through access to justice, protection of human rights, anticorruption, community engagement and support to justice system actors, with a particular focus on programs that address the insecurity and lack of opportunity driving increased migration.”

Foreign Military Financing (FMF)

The principal military assistance program in the foreign aid budget, State Department-administered FMF has gone principally to Central American military units that operate in coastal, river, and border regions.

The 2016 aid request would hold FMF for Central America at 2014 levels.

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The aid request explains that FMF will “support partner efforts to control national territory and borders,” as well as “security sector reform to ensure that at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels each country has the ability to manage, plan and carry out their border and maritime missions in the most effective manner to counter TCOs [transnational criminal organizations].”

International Military Education and Training (IMET)

Administered by the State Department, IMET funds training courses for foreign militaries. This relatively small program would not grow in the 2016 request. The aid request lists Honduras, along with Colombia and Mexico, as a priority country for the IMET program in the Western Hemisphere. El Salvador is the only country that would see less IMET assistance in 2016, a modest cut of $300,000; the document does not explain why.

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Aid in Addition to the Request

The foreign aid budget includes other, smaller programs for which the 2016 aid request does not yet supply aid amounts for Central America. These include Nonproliferation, Antiterrorism, Demining and Related Programs (NADR), USAID’s Transition Initiatives (OTI), Migration and Refugee Assistance (MRA), the Inter-American Foundation (IAF), and others.

El Salvador and Honduras are also receiving generous grants of economic assistance from the Millennium Challenge Corporation, an aid program begun during the Bush administration.

Much additional military aid flows through the Defense budget. The main program channeling military and police aid to Central America is the Pentagon’s authority to use its counter-drug budget to provide certain assistance to foreign security forces.

Congress does not require the Defense Department to provide any estimate of how it plans to spend such funds in 2016. But from two required reports to Congress, we know that $33.7 million went to Central American nations in 2013, and $9.7 million in the first half of 2014.

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This paid for training, construction at military and police bases, intelligence, and equipment upgradesge will fare once it goes to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees, then both full chambers, over the spring and summer as part of the annual State Department and Foreign Operations budget appropriation.

WOLA encourages Congress to fund the full amount, at the current proportions between aid programs. More details are pending, and WOLA encourages Congress to ensure that U.S. programs are carefully targeted and focus on those governments and agencies that are genuinely committed to fighting the corruption and impunity that undermine state institutions. Overall, though, this budget request appears to be a thoughtful approach that directly confronts the circumstances that have compelled so many Central Americans to leave their homeland.

The following table brings together all Central America assistance in the State Department’s “2016 Congr. Significant recent examples include coastal drug-interdiction bases for the Honduran Navy and the creation of army-police-prosecutor task forces, “Tecún Umán” and “Chortí,” operating along Guatemala’s borders with Mexico and Honduras.

Approval Will Take Several Months

These programs will continue into 2016 regardless of whether Congress approves the Obama administration’s $1 billion request. It is unclear how the new aid packaessional Budget Justification for Department of State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs,” released February 2, 2015. Snip

Last updated: March 22, 2021

HISTORY OF USAID IN MEXICO
Language: English | Spanish

Crime and violence prevention.
USAID and the private sector join forces to prevent crime and violence prevention.
Indira Villegas / USAID

Development cooperation between the United States and Mexico began before USAID was created. The first formal agreement between the two governments to provide development assistance was through the Mutual Security Act of 1951. During that time, the United States focused on health programs, academic exchanges between U.S. and Mexican universities, food security, housing guarantees, and innovative models of entrepreneurship.

In 1961, President John F. Kennedy signed into law the Foreign Assistance Act, which led to the creation of USAID as the lead agency for all foreign assistance programs. USAID officially began work in Mexico as a continuation of the development programs under the Mutual Security Act, expanding its assistance to include economic growth, technology transfers, disaster relief, and democratic governance.

USAID Mexico Director Tom Donnelly and World Bank President Alden Clausen
USAID Mission Director Tom Donnelly (R) and World Bank President Alden Clausen (L) visit a family planning clinic, circa 1981.
USAID/Mexico
Between 1965 and 1977, USAID did not implement programs in Mexico following a global realignment of assistance efforts. It was not until the late 1970s that USAID resumed its development programming, focusing on population and family planning. Within two years of USAID’s re-entry into Mexico, USAID became the lead donor in the health and population sector, providing assistance across virtually every program area, including service delivery, information services and communication, data collection and analysis, training, operations research, and contraceptive supplies.

A difficult but important moment for American foreign assistance in Mexico occurred in response to the 1985 earthquake. An earthquake measuring 8.1 on the Richter scale killed more than 4,000 people in Mexico City. The U.S. response to the tragedy was immediate and massive. Within a week, over 1,000 U.S. disaster assistance personnel from a dozen United States Government agencies, local government, and private institutions were in Mexico City. First Lady Nancy Reagan and USAID Administrator Peter McPherson also visited to express their sympathy for and solidarity with the people of Mexico. USAID demonstrated a tremendous capacity to deliver rapid, essential, and substantial humanitarian aid at a moment of great need.

President Ernesto Zedillo (C) announces the creation of the Mexican Conservation Fund in May 1994.
President Ernesto Zedillo (C) announces the creation of the Mexican Conservation Fund in May 1994. Also shown are Mexican Secretary of Environment Julia Carabias (L) and Mission Director Art Danart (R).
USAID/Mexico
The strong cooperation between the United States and Mexico has produced some key successes over the course of the bilateral relationship. One major success includes the establishment of the Mexican Conservation Fund(link is external), which was a new concept whereby funds, for the first time, were placed in an institution that the Government of Mexico did not control. Subsequently, a multidisciplinary group of 21 environmental specialists, receiving joint funding from the United States and the Government of Mexico, carried out an extensive consultation process with over 250 conservation organizations in Mexico. The result was three additional Mexican conservation funds, including the protection of the Meso-American Reef and the Gulf of California. The model has been replicated by more than 20 countries around the world and is now an international best practice.

USAID partnered with the Mexican Red Cross
USAID partnered with the Mexican Red Cross to distribute emergency relief commodities to storm-affected populations following hurricanes Ingrid and Manuel in late September 2013.
USAID Mexico
Another successful model of cooperation includes USAID’s support of exchanges between Mexican and other governments to share information on various best practices to address common development challenges. USAID also invested in university and state-level partnership programs to support scholarships for indigenous populations. Other examples of collaboration include U.S. support to the Mexican Government to control tuberculosis outbreaks along the U.S.-Mexico border, the training of Mexican personnel in wildfire suppression, management of hazardous materials, and natural disaster management.

Today, Mexico is among USAID’s most self-reliant partner countries, the world’s 15th largest economy, and a functioning liberal democracy with high levels of capacity. In USAID’s 2021 Country Roadmap, Mexico exhibits high levels of commitment to trade freedom, business environment, and biodiversity and habitat protection. It scores high in its capacity related to child health, civil society and media effectiveness, and export sophistication. The Mission continues to actively engage Mexico’s private sector through strategic alliances that encourage innovation and leverage resources to increase program impact, enhance sustainability, and replicate successful interventions across the country.

USAID selected the Country Development Cooperation Strategy (CDCS) 2020-2025 Goal of “U.S.-Mexico Strategic Partnership Advanced through Mutual Security and Prosperity” to accentuate that this is a relationship of peers, not of a donor and a recipient, focused on challenges of strategic interest and mutual benefit to both countries, where burden-sharing is evident and foreign assistance can add value.

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