Pandemic of the migrants or pandemic of the unvaccinated?
How COVID-19 is further securitizing migration
On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a global pandemic. Not even two weeks later, 174 countries, territories, or areas around the world implemented COVID-19 related travel restrictions. As borders swiftly closed to limit human mobility and thus the spread of the virus, the United States and Europe have further securitized migration. Securitization involves the reframing of migration, generally due to economic or national identity concerns, as a security issue. The pandemic has added a new dimension of securitization in the form of health security. In the United States and Europe, migrants are being increasingly perceived as an existential threat to the health and safety of national citizens.
Through the securitization of migration, countries have used the pandemic as a pretext to justify restrictive measures that discriminate against migrants. For example, in March 2020, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) invoked Title 42, allowing the rapid expulsion of individuals arriving at the border. As part of an old public health law, Title 42 is originally intended to prevent the spread of disease. However, the United States has instead applied it to target migrants by denying them the chance to seek protection, and thus violating U.S. asylum law. Since March 2020, Border Patrol has expelled more than 1.1 million migrants under this order.
It is important to note that Title 42 originated in the Department of Homeland Security under President Donald Trump, who made his desire to secure the southern border quite vocal throughout his campaign and presidency. Despite expressing opposition due to the lack of public health evidence supporting the need for such an order, CDC officials faced political pressure to issue it. Policies like this blur the lines between health and security, further contributing to the securitization of migration during the pandemic.
Moreover, policies intended to stop the spread of the virus via migration controls may actually be doing more harm than good. A study published in The Lancet found high levels of COVID-19 transmission amongst refugees and asylum seekers in reception facilities in Greece. However, the risk of infection has also been higher than the general population. Following the first COVID-19 case in the Moria migrant camp back in September 2020, Greek officials ordered a quarantine to “prevent” the spread of the virus. These camps are notoriously overcrowded and unsanitary. However, that did not deter Greece from putting them into lockdown while eschewing a public health-driven response with measures like social distancing. Ultimately, the goal was to protect national citizens, not migrants. This othering is key to securitization; in framing migration as a health security issue, migrants are relegated to second-class citizens.
Inflammatory rhetoric that portrays migrants as scapegoats further fuels the securitization of migration. In a tweet in March 2021, Texas Governor Greg Abbott blamed the Biden Administration for “recklessly releasing hundreds of illegal immigrants who have COVID.” Across the Atlantic in Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said: “We are fighting a two-front war, one front is called migration, and the other one belongs to the coronavirus, there is a logical connection between the two, as both spread with movement.” In Italy, a Facebook post by the League, a radical right party known for anti-immigrant views, claims that there are free hotels for illegal immigrants but no hospital beds for those with COVID-19. This notion that migrants divert social assistance and welfare provisions away from national citizens has been a central theme in the securitization of migration in the European Union. The disguising of anti-migration rhetoric as concern for public health further paints migrants as a security threat.
Indeed, given that the virus is commonly spread through close contact and air-borne transmission, there are legitimate health concerns regarding human mobility. According to multiple studies, border closures were effective early in the pandemic in limiting COVID-19 transmission. However, these same studies also revealed that the benefits of closures were unsustainable without additional measures like testing and contact tracing, both of which the United States and Europe failed in.
The vaccine is another vital measure in controlling the spread of the virus. In the United States, hospitalizations continue to rise in the least vaccinated states. Likewise, Europe is facing a resurgence of COVID-19 cases due to relaxation of public health measures and slowing down of vaccination rates. Further undermining public health efforts, many countries in Europe have excluded undocumented immigrants from their vaccination programs. As Dr. Ivan Melendez, the local health authority in Hidalgo County, Texas said in a press conference in August 2021, “Is this a pandemic of the migrants? No, this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated.”
On November 8, 2021, the United States began to accept fully vaccinated foreign travelers. After more than an 18-month ban on international travel from countries in Europe, amongst others, visitors can enter the United States just in time for the holidays. According to a tweet from a White House spokesman, the policy “is guided by public health, stringent, and consistent.” Yet, the easing of travel restrictions comes just as Europe once again leads the world in percentage of new cases and deaths due to the virus. Consequently, on November 2, the U.S State Department updated the Travel Advisory to ‘Level 4: Do Not Travel’ for 14 European countries. This disconnect between public health guidance and actual policy elucidates that health is not the priority it should be if migration were not securitized.
The pandemic is a global health and humanitarian crisis. However, because of the securitization of migration, it is being handled with restrictive measures to limit human mobility. While the pandemic hopefully nears its end, the impact of securitization on migration discourse and its resulting policies will likely continue.
