밀입국 이민자들, 조지아서 ‘희망 없다’

Detention facilities such as Atlanta are already saturated.
The immigration court approval rate is also the lowest in the country.

Georgia, which does not share a southern border with Mexico, is also receiving a large influx of illegal immigrants, but it faces a hopeless and uncertain future.

According to Customs and Border Protection (CBP), in the first 10 months of this fiscal year, illegal entry cases detected at the border with Mexico exceeded 1.8 million, an all-time high. They temporarily stay in the United States to apply for asylum.

According to a recent Atlanta Journal (AJC) report, there is no agency in Georgia that tracks and counts these illegal immigrants, so there are no accurate statistics, but charities complain that they have reached their limit in supporting immigrants who have nowhere to go.

Immigrants can illegally cross the border to seek asylum, but the outcome may differ depending on which state’s immigration court decides. Immigration judges in cities with Democratic mayors, such as New York, San Francisco and Chicago, are more likely to grant asylum, while applications such as Houston and Atlanta are very unlikely to be granted.

Georgia nonprofits said migrants were transported by bus from Texas to New York and Washington, DC, but many stopped in the northwest Georgia area en route. They changed their destination after hearing rumors that there were many jobs in Atlanta and that prices were cheap.

“I’ve heard that immigrants prefer Atlanta because it’s relatively cheaper to rent than other big cities,” said Anton Floris-Mesonet, who runs an immigration service in Decatur, Georgia. As asylum seekers flock to Georgia, the immigrant facility he runs has long since exceeded its capacity.

In a situation where there is no proper support from the state government, the situation of receiving facilities for immigrants is getting more and more difficult. Asylum-seekers generally have to wait up to a year after arrival before obtaining a legal work permit, making it difficult to find other places to live.

Other organizations, including the Brookhaven-based Latin American Association (LAA), argue that adequate humanitarian assistance is needed for the influx of migrants. However, the state government and local city governments, including the city of Atlanta, are still consistent with inaction.

Illegal immigrants who choose Georgia are at an even greater disadvantage. This is because Atlanta has one of the lowest immigration approval rates in the nation.

Syracuse University analyzed data from 2016 to 2021 and found that more than 90% of the 2,588 asylum applications received in Atlanta were rejected. Experts advise that it is better to move to a city with a higher asylum application rate than Georgia. The low approval rate of immigration courts is also a problem, but due to a severe backlog of trials, it takes an average of seven years to receive a ruling nationwide.

Reporter Jia Yoon