The Office of Customs and Border Protection of the United States (CBP in English) denied that Border Patrol agents are giving Social Security numbers to people who cross the country’s border irregularly.
The agency made the clarification after former Fox Nation host Lara Logan denounced in a video that went viral that US Border Patrol officers were distributing Social Security numbers to migrants at the border.
Given this situation, a CBP spokesman confirmed that its agents do not have the authority to give this type of documentation. Experts assure that irregular migrants in the United States are not eligible to receive Social Security numbers, unless they meet certain requirements that allow an exception.
What circulated in the networks. The audiovisual was recorded on Saturday at an event that promoted electoral conspiracies in Tempe, an Arizona city. There Logan told the audience, “Now, when people cross the border illegally, and I have this confirmed by Border Patrol agents who are actually physically doing this … they give them a Social Security number. They are assigned a Social Security number when they cross.”
- This video was spread on blogs and websites aimed at conservatives.
- The claim was shared by users on Twitter.
It’s false. CBP spokeswoman Rhonda Lawson explained in an email to the AP that this is not happening: “Border Patrol does not have the ability or authority to issue Social Security numbers and therefore does not issue Social Security numbers. Social to non-citizens who crossed the border”.
- Experts believe that Logan’s statements are unfounded and do not show the process that migrants should go through to obtain a social security number.
- The director of the Immigration Clinic at the University of Texas Law School in Austin, Denise Gilman, explained that non-citizens are only eligible for Social numbers if they are authorized by the Department of Social Security to work. She cited as an example that asylum seekers can obtain it after receiving a work authorization and thus pay their taxes.
- However, applicants can take months to apply for a social security number.
Title 42. Gilman recalls that a large part of the migrants who seek to enter the United States do not even have the possibility of requesting asylum and are expelled under Title 42, a law imposed during the Donald Trump mandate and whose objective is to stop the circulation of COVID- 19 in the country.
- “Under the current restrictive policies at the border, it’s actually a fairly small percentage of people who come in, can apply for asylum, and then eventually get work authorization and a Social Security number,” he explained.
Main source: AP
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