2026-10-21T16:00:44.858Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/21/politics/state-department-latin-america-cities
据美国有线电视新闻网（CNN）查阅的内部文件显示，美国国务院一方面公开就拉美部分地区的暴力犯罪向美国民众发出警告，另一方面却私下向移民庇护官员提供新的评估报告，声称其中部分国家的安全状况并不比美国部分城市更危险。
这些此前从未被报道过的文件聚焦墨西哥、洪都拉斯、危地马拉和萨尔瓦多。与国务院过往评估报告中经常强调的人权问题、绑架和勒索高发率不同，新报告将这些国家的暴力犯罪率与巴尔的摩、休斯顿、孟菲斯等美国城市进行比较，称其情况更乐观。
此次新评估是特朗普政府全面改革庇护官员审核移民申请方式、限制有资格留在美国的人群的整体举措的一部分。
庇护申请人必须证明自己因“有充分理由害怕遭受迫害”而无法或不愿返回原籍国。通过降低这些国家的感知威胁程度，新评估报告将直接影响相关庇护申请的审核结果，包括移民能否在本国境内安全安置而非留在美国的判定。
“往届政府时期，人们对这些国家的真实危险程度存在过度简化的认知，但这次似乎走向了另一个极端，”无党派智库移民政策研究所所长安德鲁·西利说道。
国务院表示，这些评估报告由具备地区专业知识的人员撰写，并 circulated 供包括美国驻外使团在内的各方审核。其中一份文件称，它们“旨在为审核人员评估保护申请提供背景信息”。
负责管理庇护申请的国土安全部将CNN关于国家报告的问题转交给了国务院。
国务院发言人在给CNN的书面声明中表示，国务院“可能会向（美国公民及移民服务局）和移民法院提供有关外国国情的信息。此类信息旨在为美国公民及移民服务局人员和移民法官提供有用的背景参考。”
这些新文件已分发给国土安全部下属负责处理移民福利的美国公民及移民服务局，文件称墨西哥、洪都拉斯、危地马拉和萨尔瓦多的暴力犯罪率低于美国部分主要城市。例如，文件称墨西哥和萨尔瓦多的许多地区“暴力犯罪率至少比美国主要城市低一个数量级”。
庇护官员通常依赖国务院年度人权报告来评估申请人原籍国的国情。该报告涵盖上一年度情况，通常在每年3月或4月发布，但今年的报告被推迟了。因此，新的评估报告为官员们在审核申请时提供了更新的国情参考信息。
庇护申请驳回率本已居高不下。例如，根据锡拉丘兹大学交易记录信息清除中心的数据，今年6月94%的庇护申请被驳回，这较两年前约50%的驳回率出现了大幅上升。
这些文件显示，特朗普政府正通过与美国的对比来评估两个可决定庇护申请结果的关键问题：原籍国政府能否提供保护，以及申请人能否在本国境内安全安置。
“当你看到一份政府报告与以往报告存在如此大的分歧时，这会敲响警钟，尤其是在当地局势没有出现明显变化、足以支撑这种差异的情况下，”西利说道，“适当的调整是可以的，你可以修正以往报告中的侧重点，但这次似乎是对当地局势做出了全面的颠覆性判断。”
根据国务院网站上的旅行警告，该部门因暴力犯罪和恐怖主义问题，呼吁美国民众不要前往洪都拉斯，还特别指出洪都拉斯的格拉西亚斯-阿迪奥斯省犯罪问题严重。
国务院公开的旅行警告提及了该地区的犯罪问题。但内部文件却称，洪都拉斯该地区及其他城市的暴力犯罪率“与美国部分地区的暴力犯罪率相比更为乐观”，包括巴尔的摩、休斯顿和孟菲斯。
“当然，这些数据并不代表美国的整体情况，”文件在某一部分写道，“相反，它们旨在表明，即使在发达国家，各地的情况也存在差异。此外，它们也说明了为什么不能仅凭某些地区的情况就对一个国家的整体局势做出笼统判断。”
文件还断言，洪都拉斯警方“愿意且能够响应居民的援助请求，主要限制因素是车辆储备、响应时间挑战以及农村地区的服务覆盖不均”。文件称，这种情况在美国也同样存在。
但西利表示，实际情况要复杂得多。
“这显然低估了警方与有组织犯罪团伙勾结的程度，”西利说道，“与美国的不同之处在于，当地人往往会面临暴力威胁，却没有值得信赖的机构能够保护他们。”
新文件称，人们可以在这四个国家自由流动，包括虐待和勒索的受害者。尽管专家表示这或许属实，但他们指出，部分有组织犯罪团伙在全国范围内构成威胁，这意味着即使搬迁，人们仍可能处于潜在危险之中。
“现实情况是，有些人与犯罪团伙产生冲突后，在该国任何地方都无法安全生存，”西利说道。
前美国公民及移民服务局官员表示，判断申请人能否在本国境内安置一直是庇护官员常规的问询内容。
“你能否在本国境内安置的问题，一直是官员们可以也应该考虑的因素，”一位前美国公民及移民服务局官员告诉CNN。
特朗普政府官员多次表示，与国务院人权报告相互独立的旅行警告是针对美国民众发布的，而非针对当地国民。
国土安全部部长马克韦恩·马林今年6月在接受CNN记者杰克·塔珀采访时，在被问及海地的安全问题时为政府的政策进行了辩护，海地同样被列入了旅行警告名单。
“我们对墨西哥部分地区发布了‘请勿前往’的警告或 advisory 警告。事实上，如果你登录国务院的网站，你会看到许多度假胜地都有相关警告，因为那里对美国人存在真正的风险，”马林说道。
“但这并不意味着当地居民也面临同样的风险，”他补充道。
Exclusive: State Department warns Americans about Latin America. Privately, it tells asylum officers a different story
2026-10-21T16:00:44.858Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/21/politics/state-department-latin-america-cities
The State Department is publicly warning Americans about violent crime in parts of Latin America, but privately, it has given asylum officers new assessments arguing that conditions in some of those same countries are no more dangerous than in some US cities, according to internal documents reviewed by CNN.
The documents, which have not been previously reported, focus on Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador. Rather than emphasizing human rights issues and the prevalence of kidnapping and extortion often highlighted in State Department assessments, they instead compare violent-crime rates in those countries favorably with US cities such as Baltimore, Houston and Memphis.
The new assessments are part of a broader Trump administration effort to overhaul the way claims from migrants are assessed by asylum officers — and limit who’s eligible to remain in the United States.
Asylum applicants must prove they are unable or unwilling to return to their home country because of a “well-founded fear” of persecution. By lowering the perceived threats in those countries, the new assessments will likely bear directly on those claims, including determinations of whether migrants can safely relocate inside their own country rather than seeking to stay in the US.
“There’s been an oversimplification of real dangers in these countries during other administrations, but this seems to be going too far in the other direction,” said Andrew Selee, president of the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan thinktank.
The State Department says the assessments were prepared by personnel with regional expertise and circulated for review, including to US missions overseas. They are “intended to provide background for adjudicators as they evaluate protection claims,” one document states.
The Department of Homeland Security, which manages asylum claims, referred CNN’s questions about the country reports to the State Department.
In a written statement to CNN, a State Department spokesman said the department “may provide information about conditions in foreign countries to (US Citizenship and Immigration Services) and immigration courts. Such information is intended to provide useful background for USCIS personnel and immigration judges.”
The new documents were distributed to US Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency inside DHS that processes immigration benefits, and state that violent crime in Mexico, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador is lower than in some major US cities. In Mexico and El Salvador, for example, the documents claim that many areas “have violent crime rates at least one order of magnitude lower than those of major US cities.”
Asylum officers generally rely on the State Department’s annual human rights report to assess conditions in an applicant’s home country. That report, which covers the prior year and is usually released in March or April, has been delayed this year. The new assessments therefore give officers more recent country conditions to consider when reviewing claims.
Asylum denials are already high. In June, for example, 94% of asylum cases were denied, according to the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University. That’s a dramatic increase from two years ago when the asylum denial rate hovered around 50%.
The documents show how the Trump administration is using comparisons with the US to evaluate two questions that can determine an asylum claim: whether a home government can provide protection and whether an applicant could safely relocate within the country.
“When you see a government report differ so much from previous reports, it raises red flags, especially if conditions on the ground haven’t changed in a noticeable way that would warrant that,” Selee said. “Some change is OK. You can correct the emphasis in prior reports, but this seems like a wholesale shift in conditions on the ground.”
The State Department warns against travel to Honduras, citing violent crime and terrorism, according to an alert on its website. It specifically cites Gracias a Dios Department, a region in Honduras, for its crime.
The State Department’s public travel warning cites crime in the region. The internal documents, however, say violent-crime rates there and in other Honduran cities “compare favorably with rates of violent crime in parts of the United States,” including Baltimore, Houston and Memphis.
“Of course, these figures do not represent the entirety of the United States,” the document states in one part. “Rather, they demonstrate that, even in developed countries, conditions vary. Further, they demonstrate why a general judgement cannot be made concerning a country’s conditions based on conditions in certain areas.”
The documents also assert that police in Honduras are “willing to and able to respond to requests for assistance from residents, with the main constraints being vehicle storages, response-time challenges, and uneven rural access.” That, too, it states can happen in the United States.
But the realities on the ground are more complicated, Selee said.
“That clearly understates the degree to which police forces are in collusion with organized crime groups,” Selee said. “The difference with the United States is that often people face violence but no trustworthy institutions that can protect them.”
The new documents state that people can move freely in each of the countries. That includes victims of abuse and extortion. While experts say that may be the case, they note that some organized crime groups can pose a threat across the country, meaning that even by relocating, people remain in potential danger.
“The reality is that there are some people who fall afoul of criminal groups and cannot be safe anywhere in the country,” Selee said.
Former USCIS officials said that determining whether someone can relocate in country has been part of the regular line of questioning by asylum officers.
“The question of whether you can relocate in your own country has always been something an officer can and should consider,” a former USCIS official told CNN.
Trump officials have repeatedly said that travel warnings, which are separate from the State Department’s human rights reports, are intended for US citizens and not nationals of that country.
Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, speaking to CNN’s Jake Tapper in June, defended the administration’s policies when asked about the safety of Haiti, which also has a travel warning.
“We have ‘Do not travel’ in places in Mexico or advisory warnings. In fact, if you go through our website in the State Department, you’ll see there’s advisories to a lot of places that are vacation destinations that we have advisories on because of the real risk to Americans,” said Mullin.
“That doesn’t mean it’s a risk to people who live there,” he added.
发表回复