August 2021 - KISSLOROD

Foreign Students Struggle with Remote Learning

Throughout the pandemic, college students in the U.S. have struggled with studying remotely. The same is true for foreign students enrolled in American universities. Connor Smith has this report. …

Mexican Troops Disrupt Migrants Heading North From Border

Several hundred migrants, including many children, headed north from near Mexico’s border with Guatemala on Saturday hoping to reach the U.S., but Mexican security forces dispersed the group several hours later.About 300 Haitians, Cubans and Central Americans set out on foot from the town of Tapachula, and a few hundred more migrants joined in as the walk progressed.After about eight hours, they passed through an immigration checkpoint without problems, but then National Guard troops in riot gear blocked their way as a heavy rain fell. Some of the migrants were arrested while others eluded capture and kept heading north. By Saturday night about 200 had arrived the town of Huixtla, said the Rev. Heyman Vazquez, a priest who works with migrants.Immigration agents also helped break up the group. An Associated Press journalist saw one immigration agent kick a migrant who was already immobilized and on the ground.The Collective of Monitoring and Documentation of Human Rights of the Southeast, which is a coalition of groups that work with migrants, said some people were injured though it gave no numbers. It said the detained migrants had been loaded on buses and driven away.The flow of migrants from Central America has increased since …

Migrant Children Spend Weeks at US Shelters as More Arrive

Five months after the Biden administration declared an emergency and raced to set up shelters to house a record number of children crossing the U.S.-Mexico border alone, kids continue to languish at the sites, while more keep coming, child welfare advocates say.More than 700 children spent three weeks or longer at the government’s unlicensed sites in mid-July, according to declarations filed with a federal court overseeing custody conditions for immigrant youth. Advocates say children should be released quickly to their relatives in the U.S. or sent to a licensed facility.In one of the filings, a 16-year-old Salvadoran boy said children were served raw meat. It took more than a month for the boy, who said he speaks with both his parents each week, to be released to his father in Georgia.“When I wake up every day, I feel really frustrated. Of the youth that I arrived with, I am the last one here,” the boy said in his declaration. “I would like to be home with my dad right now.”When the Biden administration erected the emergency sites in March to ease dangerous overcrowding at border stations, they were meant to be a temporary fix. But months later, some wonder whether …

US Supreme Court Orders ‘Remain in Mexico’ Policy Reinstated

The Supreme Court on Tuesday said the Biden administration likely violated federal law in trying to end a Trump-era program that forces people to wait in Mexico while seeking asylum in the U.S.With three liberal justices in dissent, the high court refused to block a lower court ruling ordering the administration to reinstate the program informally known as Remain in Mexico.It’s not clear how many people will be affected and how quickly. Under the lower court ruling, the administration must make a “good faith effort” to restart the program.There also is nothing preventing the administration from trying again to end the program, formally called Migrant Protection Protocols.A federal judge in Texas had previously ordered that the program be reinstated last week. Both he and the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals refused the administration’s request to put the ruling on hold.Justice Samuel Alito ordered a brief delay to allow the full court time to consider the administration’s appeal to keep the ruling on hold while the case continues to make its way through the courts.The 5th Circuit ordered expedited consideration of the administration’s appeal.The court offered little explanation for its action, although it cited its opinion from last year rejecting …

Supreme Court Orders ‘Remain in Mexico’ Policy Reinstated

Foreign Students Struggle to Get COVID-19 Vaccinations in US

Some international students in the United States are struggling to get fully vaccinated against COVID-19 before returning to school this fall. Connor Smith has this report. …

Courts Deliver Setbacks to Biden Administration Immigration Agenda

While the Biden administration focuses on the Afghanistan evacuation crisis, serious problems fester at the U.S.-Mexico border with increasing numbers of unaccompanied children and two important court rulings complicating the administration’s efforts to implement its immigration policies.The Unaccompanied minor migrants wait to be transported by the U.S. Border Patrol after crossing the Rio Grande river into the United States from Mexico in Roma, Texas, Aug. 14, 2021.‘Remain in Mexico’ RulingOn Thursday, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals denied the Biden administration’s attempt to halt a Texas judge’s ruling demanding the government resume a controversial Trump-era border policy known as Migrant Protection Policy (MPP) — the so-called “remain in Mexico” measure.Former President Donald Trump’s White House announced the directive in 2019, which gave border patrol agents power to send non-Mexican asylum-seekers to Mexico, where they had to wait for their asylum cases to be reviewed and processed by U.S. immigration courts, rather than allowing them to stay in the U.S.Human rights activists said an estimated 68,000 migrants were sent back to Mexico under the policy and were often assaulted, kidnapped and extorted. Fewer than 2% won their cases in U.S. immigration courts.The Biden administration deemed the directive excessively harsh and ended …

Canada’s Foreign Students Look Warily for Return to Normal

Canadian universities are nervously eyeing an uptick in COVID-19 cases driven by the delta variant, hoping it will not upend plans for a return to in-person classes for international students, many of whom spent the past year studying remotely from their home countries. With more than 72% of the population at least partly vaccinated and new cases dipping below 300 per day earlier this summer, the government announced an easing of restrictions on admission of foreign visitors to the country effective September 7, just in time for the start of a new school year. Caseloads still remain low compared to the United States and some other countries, but have been rising due to the delta variant and are now approaching 2,000 per day. That is of concern to university administrators, who rely heavily on foreign student tuition fees to balance their budgets. FILE – A health care worker administers the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine at The Church of Pentecost Canada in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, May 4, 2021.Canada’s immigration agency reports that 530,540 international students held permits to study in the country as of December 31, down from 638,960 students a year earlier. That was the first decline in foreign enrollment in the last 20 …

Complex US Refugee Policies Likely to Limit Number of Afghan Admissions

Despite round-the-clock efforts by the military to evacuate Afghans loyal to the United States in the wake of the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan just days ago, immigration experts say it is unknown how many of them will actually be admitted to the U.S. as refugees.With less than two months left in the current fiscal year, the U.S. is on track to finish with the lowest number of refugee admissions ever recorded — a testament in part to the anti-immigration sentiment among many Americans that flourished under former President Donald Trump and persists during the Biden administration.The U.S. has welcomed only 6,250 refugees in fiscal 2021 under President Joe Biden, far below a refugee cap of 85,000 in fiscal 2016, in the final year of the Obama administration.Upon taking office in 2017, Trump suspended the resettlement program for 120 days, which significantly slowed the admission processing. He then set the refugee admission cap at 50,000 and FILE – Megan Carlton with the Refugee Services of Texas walks through a home her organization set up for an Afghani refugee family in Dallas, Aug. 17, 2021.Experts predict only a small number of the Afghans able to depart Kabul in the coming weeks aboard …

Afghan Students in India Fear Returning After Taliban Takeover

Afghan students enrolled in Indian colleges and universities worry about the future that their country holds for them following the Taliban takeover there. India has a large Afghan student community, with most having come on scholarships offered by the Indian government as a goodwill gesture to promote education in the country. Anjana Pasricha spoke to a group of students enrolled in colleges in Chandigarh city in North India.Camera: Rakesh Kumar, Producer: Jon Spier …

Afghan Students in India Fear Returning under Taliban Rule

Undergraduate Afghan student Saeeda Dilyabi, in the northern Indian city of Chandigarh, is deeply worried about the future that her country holds for her after the Taliban captured power.“Our lives will be in danger, our families’ life will be in danger, so I don’t think we can go back to Afghanistan,” Dilyabi said, sitting in a park scrolling her phone for the latest news on Afghanistan.She is among hundreds of Afghans studying in Indian colleges and universities on scholarships offered by the Indian government as a goodwill gesture to promote education in the country.Students like her epitomize the rights won by women in Afghanistan in the last 20 years – they live independently in Indian cities, are not covered with veils and are imbibing a modern education. They had hoped to go back and work in a country that was making progress.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can Meena Azimi, an Afghan undergraduate studying in India, says she does not trust the Taliban and will never return to Afghanistan if the group remains in power.Dilyabi echoed those feelings.“Exactly what they will do is not same as what they say. They are saying it to …

Afghan Students Fearful as Taliban Takeover Continues

Afghan university students in the U.S. and Afghanistan react to the Taliban takeover of their country. …

Biden Administration Proposes Plan to Speed Up Asylum Cases at US-Mexico Border

The Biden administration unveiled a proposal Wednesday to accelerate the handling of asylum claims along the U.S.-Mexico border to address a record-high backlog of roughly 1.3 million cases.Under the proposed plan, asylum-seekers who establish they have a credible fear of persecution and are placed in expedited removal proceedings will be able to have their cases heard and decided by U.S. Citizenship Immigration Services (USCIS) asylum officers, rather than immigration judges who are typically overwhelmed by cases. USCIS is part of the Department of Homeland Security.The FILE – Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas speaks during a press briefing at the White House in Washington, March 1, 2021.”Individuals who are eligible will receive relief more swiftly, while those who are not eligible will be expeditiously removed,” U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement. “We are building an immigration system that is designed to ensure due process, respect human dignity and promote equity.”Those who receive a negative outcome in the initial stage will be able to appeal to the immigration courts managed by the Department of Justice.Although the rule is not expected to be implemented for months, it has the potential of changing the dynamic of the U.S. asylum system, …

Slow US Visa Process Leaves Afghans Trapped in Taliban-Controlled Kabul

For Jeffery A. Trammell, a former U.S. Army officer who served two tours in Afghanistan, the hours and days since the Taliban swept into Kabul have been an unending barrage of phone calls, emails, and text messages, all centered on one object — trying to get his former Afghan interpreter safely out of the country.The interpreter, whose first name is Najeeb, is one of thousands of Afghans who served with U.S. forces and later applied for a Special Immigrant Visa that would allow them to leave the country with their families. But despite letters of recommendation from Trammell and years of waiting, Najeeb’s visa was never approved.For days after the Taliban entered Kabul, Najeeb, his wife and three daughters hid out in a home in Kabul that is within sight of Hamid Karzai International Airport, access to which has been limited by Taliban checkpoints. He occasionally snapped pictures of giant C-17 military transport planes as they took off from the runway and texted them to Trammell, along with pleas for information.‘The Taliban are now going home to home’“He’s like, ‘Keep updating me, because the Taliban are now going home to home looking for people,’” Trammell said.On Wednesday, Najeeb and his …

Half of Nigerians Willing to Emigrate for Better Opportunities, Survey Finds

About half of Nigerians, especially youth, would be willing to leave the country for a better life, according to a July World Bank survey, an increase of nearly 20% since 2014. The report blames poor job opportunities and economic hardships, made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic. But as Timothy Obiezu reports from Abuja, some Nigerians who have tried migrating to Europe illegally say the risks are enormous.Camera: Emeka Gibson Video editor: Jason Godman …

Biden Administration Struggles to Find Coherent Message on US-Mexico Border, Critics Say

The Biden administration has struggled to deliver a coherent message about the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border, critics contend. The president and his advisers have offered sometimes contradictory assessments of the seriousness of a surge of migrants overwhelming border officials and have sent mixed messages to the migrants themselves about what will happen if they reach the United States. People who generally support the administration’s approach to migration issues are frustrated by its failure to clearly articulate what is happening and how the administration is responding. “Overall, I’d say the administration has really struggled to explain exactly what’s happening at the border, and really put some of the numbers into perspective for the American people,” said Danilo Zak, a senior policy and advocacy associate with the National Immigration Forum, an immigration reform advocacy group.Asylum-seeking migrant families arrive at the U.S. side of the bank on inflatable rafts after crossing the Rio Grande into the U.S. from Mexico in Roma, Texas, Aug. 12, 2021.”It’s been a real struggle for the administration to message effectively, and that’s caused a lot of problems for other aspects of their immigration agenda,” Zak told VOA. Opponents of President Joe Biden’s immigration policies quickly stepped into the gap, painting …

What is Critical Race Theory?

Critical race theory (CRT) has become a controversial topic in the United States, as the country wrestles with race, immigration, civil rights and civil conflict. Some states have banned its teaching in classrooms.CRT maintains that racism is deeply embedded in U.S. policy, law and society, rather than purely individual and personal, as its opponents contend.FILE – In this image from the Tennessee General Assembly, Rep. Justin Lafferty, R-Knoxville, speaks at the State Capitol in Nashville, May 4, 2021. He spoke amid debate over whether educators should be restricted while teaching about systematic racism.“Critical race theory is turning Americans against one another by weaponizing what used to be the fantasies of tenured professors in dimly lit offices of the ivory tower, now transmitting it through colleges of education to teachers who carry it into the K-12 classroom,” Lindsey Burke, director of the Center for Education Policy at the Heritage Foundation, wrote in a FILE – Kimberle Crenshaw speaks about Reconstruction at a Television Critics Association press tour in Pasadena, Calif., in 2019. Crenshaw, of the African American Policy Forum, says CRT initially was “about telling a more complete story” of America.How do educators feel about CRT in schools?Most schools across the …

Uncertainties Continue for ‘Temporary Protected Status’ Holders in US

More than half a year into the Biden administration, the future of a decades-old U.S. humanitarian program — and the fate of hundreds of thousands of immigrants who rely on it — remains murky, sowing confusion and anxiety for beneficiaries.Granted to nationals of certain countries ravaged by armed conflict or natural disasters, Temporary Protected Status (TPS) allows recipients to live and work in the United States for a limited period of time.The administration of former president Donald Trump sought to end temporary protections for nationals of several countries, sparking court challenges and creating doubts about the future of the program, which Congress established in 1990. The Biden administration has used executive authority to extend TPS and remove the immediate threat of deportations. But despite the current administration’s “friendly posture” toward TPS, questions linger about the long-term functionality of the program as mediation stemming from a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union continues, according to Julia Gelatt, senior policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute. FILE – A man holds a sign as members of the Venezuelan community react after the Biden administration said it would grant temporary protected status to Venezuelan migrants living in the United States, in Doral, Florida, …

Monthly Archives: August 2021