Central American Migration: Root Causes and U.S. Policy
Date of Publication
1-1-2023 12:00 AM
Security Theme
Migration
Keywords
surveys, asylum-seekers, poor governance, migration
Description
U.S. policy toward Central America has been a subject of significant debate and oversight over the past decade as Congress has sought to address the underlying factors driving migration from the region to the United States. According to a model developed at the University of Texas at Austin, an estimated 377,000 people, on average, left Northern Central America (see Figure 1) annually from FY2018 to FY2021, with the majority bound for the United States. Flows have varied from year to year, with an estimated 651,000 people leaving the region in FY2019, followed by 92,000 in FY2020, and 487,000 in FY2021. Surveys conducted in 2020 found many potential migrants had postponed their plans in the midst of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic but intended to undertake their journeys once governments lifted crossborder travel restrictions.
Central American Migration: Root Causes and U.S. Policy
U.S. policy toward Central America has been a subject of significant debate and oversight over the past decade as Congress has sought to address the underlying factors driving migration from the region to the United States. According to a model developed at the University of Texas at Austin, an estimated 377,000 people, on average, left Northern Central America (see Figure 1) annually from FY2018 to FY2021, with the majority bound for the United States. Flows have varied from year to year, with an estimated 651,000 people leaving the region in FY2019, followed by 92,000 in FY2020, and 487,000 in FY2021. Surveys conducted in 2020 found many potential migrants had postponed their plans in the midst of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic but intended to undertake their journeys once governments lifted crossborder travel restrictions.
