EL PASO, Texas, United States – A large group of migrants encouraged by false rumors that they could enter the United States were blocked by authorities when they tried to cross en masse the border bridge which connects Ciudad Juárez to El Paso. , Texas.
Officers erected physical barriers at the entrance to the Paso Del Norte International Bridge on Sunday afternoon in the face of “a potential threat of mass entry”, said Roger Maier, spokesman for US Customs and Border Protection, in a press release (CPB) .
Traffic had resumed in both directions by Sunday evening, he added.
As Camilo Cruz of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) team in Ciudad Juárez explained to The Associated Press, the gathering of migrants happened because there was a “rumor that they were going to let them pass en masse, especially those they came with children”.
This type of misinformation is not new. According to Cruz, something similar happened about a month ago when it was rumored that “there would be buses from the United States going to Canada…and when they arrived, they told them it was a lie”.
Most of those who gathered on the bridge were Venezuelans, some with miners on their shoulders, shouting “We want to cross!” they ran to the center line of the bridge, where US authorities had erected concrete and plastic barriers held together by concertinas, according to video at the time.
The migrants were stopped by the barrier and remained on the Mexican side, where National Guard troops were, demanding access to the United States.
“Things got a bit tense,” Cruz said, but authorities turned the migrants away and within two hours the bridge was back to normal, he added.
The US CBP spokesperson said the Special Response Team and Border Patrol members assisted customs officers.
On Sunday afternoon, temporary barricades were also erected on another border bridge between Ciudad Juárez and El Paso.
The International Organization for Migration has been warning for some time about the disinformation that is spreading in the main gathering points for migrants.
Cruz added that in addition to the frustration this can cause, another problem is that when migrants go to this type of event, they leave their places in the shelters and when they want to come back, they can already be full and they have to spend the night time in the streets.
Many migrants do not know how to complete the process to legally enter the United States amid regulations, policies and various humanitarian exceptions.
The US government launched a mobile application, CBPOne, on January 12 to make an appointment and start the procedure, but this method has generated a lot of frustration because the system has been overwhelmed and not all migrants have access to it.
Every day at 6am new appointments are offered, but strangers are greeted with error messages.
Also frustrating is the rule imposed at the start of the pandemic, due to end on May 11, which denies migrants the chance to seek asylum on the grounds of preventing the spread of COVID-19.
Under this rule, known as Title 42, Mexico recently began accepting Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans who have been there.
Additionally, the Biden administration has said it will generally deny asylum to immigrants who show up at the U.S. southern border without first seeking protection from a country through which they passed.