When Washington cracked down on U.S.-bound migrants in 1989

In 1989, The National was reporting on growing concern in the United States that too many migrants were crossing the country's southern border.

It was enough of a political issue, in fact, that newly sworn-in U.S. President George H.W. Bush's administration had already pounced on it.

"Immigration officials say too many people have been sneaking across from Mexico," host Knowlton Nash told viewers, at the start of a March 3, 1989 report on the border issue.

As Nash explained to viewers, the U.S. had boosted its border patrols the previous month. Washington had also attempted to communicate that those crossing the border illegally would be detained and then deported.

'A crackdown,' sort of

Yet from what the CBC's Terry Milewski reported, not much was changing on the ground, despite what was being said in Washington.

"There is supposed to be a crackdown going on against illegal immigration here on the Rio Grande," said Milewski, as The National showed images of people wading across the very same river, directly underneath a bridge connecting Brownsville, Tex., and Matamoros, Mexico.

As Milewski explained, a steady flow of migrants was able to cross the river in this manner, many having made their way from El Salvador and Nicaragua for a chance at a new life in the United States.

"All they have to do is wait until the border patrol is busy with someone else," said Milewski.

And according to Milewski's report, at least 1,000 people were attempting the crossing each week "desperate to escape poverty and war even if does land them in an American jail."

Milewski said those same jails were filling up faster than usual — and not because the beefed-up border patrols were apprehending more people.

"It's packed because the Bush administration is making it much more difficult for refugees to get political asylum, so they end up staying in jail instead, facing deportation," said Milewski, who visited a facility where migrants were being held after being arrested.

That policy change had been particularly harsh for Nicaraguans, who had previously been treated as political refugees when the prior U.S. president — Ronald Reagan — had been in power.

Looking for a way in

E.J. Flynn, an immigration lawyer who spoke to The National about the issue, predicted the changes to the asylum process would push desperate migrants to pursue illegal lines of entry to the United States.

"It's forced people underground. They'll be paying smugglers, they'll be finding any way they can get into this country, apart from the legal way," Flynn told The National.

But Virginia Kice, a spokesperson for the U.S. Immigration Service, suggested the government was firm in its approach to handling the situation.

 "The Immigration Service is making a commitment to the American people to address this problem and we're going to do whatever it takes to stem the tide," Kice told The National.

But again, The National poked at a divide between the policy that had been put in place and its practical application at the Texas border.

'Better to be in a jail'

Milewski visited the Casa Romero Shelter in Brownsville, where hundreds of people who had crossed the border illegally were being attended to and not being bothered by any border patrol officers.

"They have never even tried to arrest the illegals right down the street at the shelter," said Milewski.

Sister Juliana Garcia told The National that the people coming to the Catholic shelter wanted to escape the hardships of their lives in other countries and the threat of being jailed would not deter them in their efforts to cross the border.

"There are people that say: 'Better to be in a jail in [the] United States than in my country.'"