Last Updated on April 21, 2021, 8:17 AM AST by Anthony Morris
The government of US President Joe Biden will set aside 6,000 visas for seasonal gas workers for people from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador in the coming months, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said on Tuesday, a small step in the direction of establishing more legal paths from the region to the United States.
The allocation of 6,000 visas would be part of an additional 22,000 H-2B visas made available to employers in the current financial year, ending September 30, DHS said in a statement.
Business groups have sought the increase, but by unions opposed amid high unemployment linked to the coronavirus pandemic.
Biden has struggled over the past few months with an increasing number of migrants arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border, including families and unaccompanied children. In March, about 85,000 of the 172,000 migrants captured at the border came from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.
Biden officials have urged migrants not to travel to the border while systems have been put in place that allow them to seek asylum from their home countries or come to the US through other legal routes.
The extra H-2B visas are an addition to the annual allocation of 66,000 visas for the financial year, which was exhausted in February. The visas are used for landscaping, food processing and hotel work, among other seasonal work.
If the 6,000 visas are not used by companies that want to hire people from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, they will return to the general visa pool shortly before September 30, a DHS official and a second person familiar with was with the case, told the Reuters news. agency.
The visa for the so-called ‘Northern Triangle’ countries ‘demonstrates the commitment of DHS’ to create more legal avenues for migration from the region, Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement.
Anthony Morris covers stories related to politics and regional developments. His in-depth reporting about governance and reforms makes him stand out in regional journalism, with a deep analysis of political trends and their impact on Caribbean communities.
