President Joe Biden is confronting a challenging and complex situation along the Mexican border that will require political will and major policy changes to address, Northeastern’s immigration law experts say. The latest migrant numbers are unlike anything seen in recent memory, U.S. authorities say. “We are on pace to encounter more individuals on the southwest border than we have in the last 20 years,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement.
But whether it amounts to a new crisis is open to interpretation, explains Hemanth Gundavaram, who teaches immigration law and is the co-founder and director of Northeastern’s Immigrant Justice Clinic. “It is an ongoing crisis like people dying from gun violence or in our health-care system,” he says.
Gundavaram and fellow immigration law professor Rachel Rosenbloom are among the speakers who will examine the future of U.S. immigration policy at the southern border at a March 31 panel discussion sponsored by Northeastern’s law school. The event is free and open to the public.
