Shelter from the Storm: Policy Options to Address Climate Induced Displacement from the Northern Triangle
examines the large-scale migration of residents from the Northern Triangle, the geographic formation made up of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. It analyzes the impacts of climate change on migration and its relationship to current and future migration flows.
Why Central American Migrants Are Arriving at the U.S. Border
By Paul J. Angelo
March 22, 2021 9:00 am (EST)
As climate change intensifies, the people of Central America will disproportionately feel its effects and experience displacement as a result. Experts project that by 2050, climate change will displace nearly 4 million people across Mexico and Central America… said Deborah Anker, Clinical Professor of Law of Harvard Law School.
After a decade of shifting weather patterns and resultant food insecurity, back-to-back Category 5 hurricanes struck Central America [in the fall of 2020]: the storms eviscerated subsistence farms, killed hundreds of thousands of livestock, and devastated large-scale agricultural production. Many people in the region have family ties to the United States and, in the face of such adversity, migrate with the hopes of reuniting with loved ones and improving their lives.
President Biden’s approach largely relied on reviving policies that were starting to show success late in the tenure of President Barack Obama, as well as undoing unhelpful policies by President Donald J. Trump’s administration.
…Senior Trump administration officials rhetorically undermined good governance in the region, siding with deeply compromised political leadership in exchange for symbolic cooperation on migration.
How Climate Change Affects Agriculture
Wildfires and drought are two events heavily associated with climate change; according to scientific analysis of the late-winter heatwave that preceded the drought and fires, those temperatures were three times as likely because of climate change. And while wildfires and drought will become more common as carbon pollution drives up the concentration of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere, they are hardly the only two extreme weather events that farmers and ranchers will have to contend with in a changing climate; as an industry that relies on the regularity of weather and climate, everything from changing seasons to more intense precipitation will make farming more difficult in the future.
Experts Release Report on Human Migration Due to Climate Change
The experts’ report documents the deteriorating environmental conditions causing people to flee toward the United States from Central America. The Northern Triangle has already seen both increased severe weather events and long-term climate change. Last year, Hurricanes Eta and Iota ravaged Central America, marking the most active storm season on record. The convergence of the hurricanes’ impact, the COVID-19 pandemic, and preexisting socioeconomic vulnerabilities in the region will continue to push people from their homes, into urban centers, and ultimately, into the United States.
Experts project that by 2050, climate change will displace nearly 4 million people across Mexico and Central America
As climate change intensifies, the people of Central America will disproportionately feel its effects and experience displacement as a result. Immigration and human rights experts from Yale Law School, Harvard Law School, and the University Network for Human Rights have published a 90-page report charting a path for immigration reform.
https://law.yale.edu/yls-today/news/experts-release-report-human-migration-due-climate-change
Feeding America: How Immigrants Sustain US Agriculture
…compensation increases have not been enough to lure domestic workers back into agriculture. Agricultural jobs tend to be physically demanding, pose risks such as pesticide exposure, are often in remote areas, and do not offer a career ladder as other fields do. Because manual labor is not generally considered a socially prestigious occupation, even in periods of high unemployment and recessions, American-born workers do not view agriculture as a viable employment option.[5] At the same time, economic and population growth have increased the demand for fresh produce (fruits and vegetables), the production of which mostly still requires human labor. In this context, immigrants play a vital role in keeping the agricultural sector working. Today, foreign workers — both documented and undocumented — play a disproportionate role in ensuring a reliable supply of food for American households (Figure 1). The farm labor scarcity problem is particularly acute for sectors such as specialty crops (fruits and vegetables), the green industry, and livestock, which are heavily reliant on labor.[6] Mechanization is a potential alternative, but it is capital intensive, still in primitive stages, and may take a long time to be a practical solution.
…The substantial size of the undocumented farm labor force has prompted significant efforts to enact immigration reforms; however, the U.S. Congress has not passed any major immigration legislation dealing exclusively with farm workers since the Bracero Program (1942–64)
Republicans kill border bill in a sign of Trump’s strength and McConnell’s waning influence
Within 48 hours of the release of a long-awaited immigration and foreign aid bill he had championed, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s Republican conference rejected his pitch to support it, knifed the deal and left it for dead.
Just four Republicans voted for it. In the end, even McConnell backtracked and voted against the package that he had helped develop.
It was a jarring moment on Capitol Hill that pointed to a changed landscape: The Kentucky Republican, a one-man power center for more than a decade, is seeing his influence with fellow senators wane as his party continues to transform into the right-wing populist mold of Donald Trump. The former president, who fiercely opposed the border deal and has long pushed fellow Republicans to turn away from McConnell
Summary:
Migrants are coming here out of desperation.
Climate change is a disaster in Central America.
Migrants are needed to harvest our crops.
Congress needs to enact immigration reforms.
The Republicans, in response to Trump, killed the border bill, in February, 2024.
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