The Biden administration announced Thursday (27) that it plans to open processing centers in Latin America that would allow skilled migrants to legally enter the United States, Canada or Spain.

“Under the plan — one of several policy changes the Biden administration hopes will reduce illegal migration after the public emergency health order known as Title 42 ends on May 11 — people anywhere in the Western hemisphere will be able to request asylum or refugee status at the nearest processing center and choose which country they would like to migrate to”, according to the Texas Tribune.

During a news conference in Washington, D.C., U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said the first processing centers will open in Colombia and Guatemala. He said the administration expects at least 5,000 people per month to apply to legally enter one of the three receiving countries. There is no word yet on when and how many centers will open or if there will be limits on the number of people who can sign up, The Tribune said.

The agreement between the U.S., Canada and Spain came as part of the Los Angeles Declaration, which the Biden administration signed on to last summer. A number of leaders across the Western Hemisphere agreed to help each other manage the unprecedented number of migrants attempting to leave their home countries.

“The U.S. agreed to resettle 20,000 refugees over the next two fiscal years under the agreement. During Thursday’s news conference, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that 20 million people have been displaced in the Western Hemisphere in the past few years. [...] The administration also announced Thursday that it will create a new family reunification program for people from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Colombia. People from those countries will be background checked and immigration agents will determine on a case-by-case basis if they are eligible to be reunited with family already in the U.S.”, according to the Texas Tribune.

“CBP One, a cellphone-based application, will continue to allow people to request asylum from their home countries and schedule an appointment with immigration agents at a U.S. port of entry. They can also use the app from Mexico if they’ve already migrated there. The app, which became available for asylum-seekers to use in January, offers about 740 appointments per day across the southern border”.

“The administration said in a statement that while these measures should help reduce the number of people attempting to enter the country illegally, Congress needs to revise the country’s immigration laws, which haven’t seen a major overhaul since 1986, when the Reagan administration provided amnesty to 3 million people who were in the country illegally while also making it illegal for employers to hire undocumented immigrants”.

The Biden administration said it also plans to increase deportations once Title 42 is lifted. The administration said that anyone who doesn’t use one of the available pathways to enter the country legally also could be barred from requesting asylum in the future, according to The Tribune.

Some immigrant rights advocates welcomed the processing centers in Latin America, but said the administration should not bar people from requesting asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border and should include people from Africa