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Immigration advocates say a new security framework between the United States and Mexico largely sidesteps thorny migratory issues at a time of near-record arrivals at the two nations' common border.
The framework, unveiled during Secretary of State Antony Blinken's trip to Mexico City late last week, focuses on strategies to combat drug trafficking, illicit firearms and money laundering while addressing the extradition of criminals, among other security topics.
Blinken, accompanied by two other U.S. Cabinet members, met with Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and top Mexican officials. Lopez Obrador hailed a "new phase" in bilateral relations while Blinken said the two nations will work as equal partners in "defining and tightening" shared security priorities.
While the agreement aims to address human trafficking and other criminal offenses, it does not lay out a plan to deal with thousands of asylum-seekers arriving daily at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Immigration advocates welcomed the agreement, which is aimed at replacing the Merida Initiative, a 2008 pact to fight drug trafficking and organized crime, but said they wished more attention had been given to migration.
Oscar Chacon is the executive director of Alianza Americas, a U.S.-based migrant advocacy network.
Speaking with VOA, Chacon said, "The relationship with Mexico definitely has multiple implications above and beyond matters of migratory flows.
"But with that said and given how much of a high profile the issue of migration [has], I think it is, at the very least, unwise not to tackle issues of migration in a meeting like that."
Chacon said he hoped to hear more on migratory issues from Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who accompanied Blinken to Mexico City.
"Mexican and U.S. officials have said in the past that migration should not be necessarily the place to begin the conversation about the relationship between the two countries. [But] the fact of the matter is that it is a central issue. If you don't want to acknowledge that, that's an act of negligence," Chacon said.
Immigration did come up at least on the periphery of Blinken's trip.
"U.S. immigration law, of course, remains in effect. We're continuing to work very closely with Mexico to promote a safe, orderly and humane process along the shared border, and to address the myriad challenges of irregular migration," the secretary of state said in Mexico.
Attention was refocused on migration to the U.S.-Mexico border last month when thousands of Haitian asylum seekers gathered at the border town of Del Rio, Texas.
Over the last year, hundreds of thousands of people, largely from Central and South America and the Caribbean, have traveled through Mexico to reach the U.S. southern border seeking humanitarian relief.
The Biden administration maintains U.S.-Mexico consultation and cooperation on migration is already in place and robust, and therefore did not need to be a focus of the new framework stemming from what has been termed the High-Level Security Dialogue (HLSD) between the two nations.
"We already have a strong partnership with Mexico on migration with ongoing, frequent engagement, including at extremely high levels," a State Department spokesperson wrote in an email to VOA. "We are working with Mexico on the root causes of irregular migration and the humane management of borders and ports to ensure the safety of migrants and the security of the U.S. southern border. While some aspects of border security cooperation under the HLSD will have an impact on migration, a new channel of engagement was unnecessary."
The Biden administration has pledged to tackle the root causes of mass migration to America's borders by addressing poverty and strengthening institutions in Central American nations and elsewhere.
Republicans contend the administration caused the border crisis by undoing many of the hardline immigration policies of former President Donald Trump. Among the ills for which they blame Biden is a spike in drug trafficking across the U.S.-Mexico border at a time of surging drug overdose deaths in the United States.
Drug overdoses, however, have been on the rise in the U.S. since 2019.
Trump was in office from January 2017 until January 2021.
Reacting to Blinken's Mexico City trip, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted, "Biden Mexico policy reaching new records. Record illegal immigration, record overdose deaths in the United States, record homicides in Mexico. They say we must get to 'root cause.' I agree. Root cause = Biden Administration weakness."
Aline Barros is an immigration reporter for VOA's News Center in Washington, D.C. Before joining VOA in 2016, Aline worked for the Gazette Newspapers and Channel 21 Montgomery Community Media, both in Montgomery County, Md. She has been published by the Washington Post, G1 Portal Brazilian News, and Fox News Latino. Aline holds a broadcast journalism degree from University of Maryland. Follow her @AlineBarros2.