United States

The United States identified $25 million for the Global Concessional Financing Facility (GCFF) as part of our Los Angeles Declaration efforts to support refugee and host communities in eligible middle-income countries.

The United States obligated more than $314 million in humanitarian and development assistance for the region, with nearly $103 million in humanitarian assistance funding from the Bureau for Population, Refugees, and Migration to support Venezuelan refugees and migrants; $171 million from USAID’s Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance providing humanitarian aid funding and emergency food assistance for Venezuelan migrants and refugees in Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru, as well as multisectoral humanitarian support for vulnerable Venezuelans still in their home country; and $40 million in development funding from USAID’s Bureau for Latin America and the Caribbean to support the integration of migrants in Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil, Costa Rica, Panama, and Belize.

The United States has announced nearly $817 million in new assistance since September supporting Los Angeles Declaration efforts. This includes more than $240 million in new regional humanitarian and security assistance to address the immediate drivers and root causes of migration announced in Lima.  This also includes $376 million in additional humanitarian assistance for people affected by the Venezuela regional crisis and more than $199 million in additional humanitarian assistance for Mexico and Central America.

The United States announced it doubled legal labor pathways for Central America in FY2022 while enhancing worker protections. The United States issued more than 19,000 seasonal labor H-2 visas to northern Central American nationals in FY2022 compared to 9,796 in FY2021 – a 94 percent increase.  Legal labor pathways provide an alternative to irregular migration while meeting domestic labor needs for employers who can demonstrate no U.S. workers are able, willing, qualified, and available to do the temporary work, and the United States is working to further expand those pathways in FY 2023 in addition to collaborating with interagency partners to help reduce H-2 workers’ significant vulnerabilities.  The United States government is working concurrently to improve safeguards for ethical recruitment and to strengthen worker protections and will have additional announcements on these steps soon.

The United States dramatically expanded refugee resettlement in the Western Hemisphere. The United States resettled 2,485 individuals in FY 2022, a 521 percent increase over FY2021 and an eight-year high for the region.  The United States will further expand protection pathways in FY2023.

The United States began refugee resettlement for Haitian refugees. In September, the United States began refugee resettlement interviews for Haitian refugees.

The United States announced the resumption of processing immigration visas in Cuba and accelerated processing of Cuban family reunification. The United States announced in September an expansion of legal pathways available to Cubans wishing to come to the United States and an increase in personnel at the U.S. Embassy in Havana.  Beginning in early 2023, the U.S. Embassy in Havana will resume full immigrant visa processing for the first time since 2017.  Additionally, following the successful resumption of the Cuban Family Reunification Parole (CFRP) program in August, the United States announced it will increase the number of personnel in Havana to efficiently and effectively process cases and conduct interviews.

The United States will conduct six refugee processing trips in Latin America to interview more than 2,500 refugee applicants in the first quarter of FY 2023.

The United States has made more than 5,000 arrests of people suspected of crimes related to human smuggling and association with transnational criminal organizations since April 2022. The interruptions to criminal activities resulted in the seizure of hundreds of thousands of dollars, electronic devices, weapons, ammunition, and vehicles.  This campaign will continue.

The United States supports Transnational Criminal Investigative Units to improve host-country capacity to investigate transnational crime, including human trafficking and migrant smuggling in Mexico, Panama, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador.

The United States implemented the Asylum Processing Interim Final Rule (IFR) in May to allow for expedited processing of asylum claims of noncitizens who enter the United States via the U.S. border.