Chinese Human Smuggling and the U.S. Border Security Debate (CFR)

Migration across the U.S.-Mexico border is the source of polarizing debate in American politics, but rarely is it coupled with another touchy political topic: China. News of an uptick in the number of Chinese citizens smuggled across the border into southern California thus came as a surprise. In June, the San Diego Border Patrol sector reported stopping approximately 663 migrants from China over the past eight months, a 1,281 percent increase from the previous year. A spokeswoman for the Border Patrol explained, “We just weren’t getting [Chinese citizens]” before. In fact, unauthorized immigration from China is hardly a new phenomenon. Now, however, it has metastasized to different locations and taken on new, more sinister dimensions following the development of closer ties between Chinese and Latin American criminal groups.

http://blogs.cfr.org/asia/2016/07/18/chinese-human-smuggling-and-the-u-s-border-security-debate/