With the Supreme Court declining to interfere in President Biden’s immigration policy considerations, Washington is planning to turn to Mexico for assistance in blunting a surge of migrants at the southern border. 

The Supreme Court was scheduled to hear oral arguments in a case brought by Republican-led states demanding a policy that allows the expulsion of migrants at the border, known as Title 42, be maintained. On Thursday the court removed the hearing from its docket. 

The court agreed with an administration argument that because the Title 42 policy was invoked based on a Covid-related emergency, it could no longer be maintained. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention plans to declare an official end to the Covid-related emergency on May 11. 

Mr. Biden is struggling, though, to devise a new strategy to deal with the crisis at the border. “There may be an increase of people who think that because Title 42 is over, they can come in, which is not the case,” a policy analyst with the Migration Policy Institute, Ariel Ruiz Soto, tells the Sun. 

One idea Washington is contemplating is asking Mexico to take back a large number of migrants who have crossed the border illegally. The question, though, is whether President Lopez Obrador would be willing to aid Mr. Biden, and how he would convince skeptical Mexicans that doing so is good for his country.  

Mexican authorities have a history of resisting taking in American deportees who are not Mexican citizens. According to Mexican law, deportees who are not nationals are not allowed back into Mexico. Mr. Lopez Obrador has been flexible in assisting Washington with its migration woes, but he could face stiff resistance this time. 

Washington is planning to replace the Covid-era Title 42 with a long-established policy known as Title 8. That provision allows the government to deport anyone who is unable to establish a legal basis — such as need for asylum — for entering America. 

Title 8 and Title 42 have the same outcome for migrants, Mr. Ruiz Soto says. Yet, under Title 8, migrants can be sent back to their countries of origin under so-called Expedited Removal. Such cases carry tough legal penalties, including a ban on entering America for five years after removal. 

For Mexico, taking in migrants who were expelled under Expedited Removal is more challenging than accepting migrants who were sent back under Title 42. The new policy would require American immigration authorities to process migrants before sending them to Mexico. 

In the past, Mr. Lopez Obrador could argue that deportees under Title 42 were, at least technically, never accepted on the American side of the border. Under Title 8, with migrants who have been processed and deported by American authorities, Mexico would need to take in people that were actually rejected by America. 

Mr. Lopez Obrador would therefore have to make a case as to how accepting migrants deported under Title 8 benefits the Mexican people, Mr. Ruiz Soto says.

Earlier this year, Mr. Biden announced that under Title 42, Mexico has agreed to take in migrants from Cuba, Nicaragua, and Haiti who have attempted to cross the border illegally. In exchange, America would take in 30,000 pre-approved migrants from those countries monthly. An existing program already takes in 24,000 Venezuelan migrants a month. 

The Mexican president could potentially ask America to share more of the burden by taking in a larger quota of migrants, Mr. Ruiz Soto says. He is also expected to demand that Mr. Biden increases H-2B work visas for Mexicans and reduces illegal gun trafficking to Mexico from America, “which is a significant source of violence in Mexico,” Mr. Ruiz Soto adds. 

“What is less clear is the number of American visas Mexico will request to be expanded and which other nationalities will be included,” he says. 

Such demands, if accepted, could ease political pressures on Mr. Lopez Obrador at home, where anger over America’s immigration politics is rampant.   

The Mexican foreign ministry has already rejected any possibility of restarting the 2019 policy known as “remain in Mexico,” which Mr. Biden terminated in May 2022. The policy required migrants to wait outside American territory while their asylum claims were being processed. 

Mexican shelters for migrants are struggling to accommodate the throngs of people yearning to make the journey to America; they have been assisting almost twice as many migrants than they are capable of handling.