Mexican president wants to meet with Biden in Washington on migration, drug trafficking
Mexico’s top diplomat, Alicia Bárcena, said Friday that President Andrés Manuel López Obrador wants to travel to Washington D.C. in early November to meet with U.S. President Joe Biden about immigration, development aid and drug trafficking.
The statement comes after a surge in migrants moving through Mexico forced the closure of some U.S.-Mexico border crossings and led Mexico’s largest railway company to halt about 60 train runs because so many migrants were hopping aboard freight cars. Most appear to be Venezuelans, and many said they had crossed through the jungle-clad Darien Gap that connects Colombia and Panama.
Bárcena told a news conference in New York that migrant shelters in Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas, are 95% full and that the Mexican government is “very worried” about the border closures and the migrant surge, especially given Mexico’s rocky relationship with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.
