New Trend, Illegal Migration from Turkey to The USA

United States’ southern border has been witnessing a record increase in illegal entrance of Turkish citizens. According to the border patrol agents, during the 2022 fiscal year, 15.445 Turkish citizens entered the country illegally through the US-Mexican border, particularly through the border crossing at El Paso. Although it has not gotten much attention in media and academic studies mainly because there are other nationalities constituting higher numbers of migrants entering US illegally such as Mexicans, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, the rate of increase in the number of Turkish citizens entering the United States illegally is alarming. While the main reasons of the high numbers of people migrating from Erdogan’s Turkey seem to be the general insatiateness regarding economic and political problems, substandard working conditions, underdeveloped fundamental human rights protection system and other deficiencies in the country, United States’ prestigious image in the world, decent working conditions, strong economy and promising future can be counted among the main reasons that migrants prefer it as destination country. The surprising rise of Turkish citizens choosing Mexico as a transit country to enter the States is attributed to the transnational criminal organizations’ connections to Turkey. The dire circumstances Turkish people experience and their endeavor to somehow “get out of Turkey” plays into the hands of cartels. The article points out this multilateral phenomenon and sets forth the push and pull factors of the recent migration trend from Turkey to the United States over Mexico.