In retaliation to the Cubans being returned, Ramón Saúl Sánchez led a hunger strike against the policy, and on January 18, the White House agreed to meet with Sánchez at some point in the near future. After eleven days, the hunger strike was ended, and Sánchez has yet to meet with White House officials. On February 28, 2007, a federal judge ruled that the United States government had acted unreasonably when it sent home the 15 Cubans. The judge ordered the government to make its best effort to help the immigrants return to the United States. Fourteen of the 15 Cubans re-landed on December 15, 2006 and were given migrant visas. Since the late-1980s immigration patterns changed. Many Cuban immigrants departed from the southern and western coasts of Cuba and arrived at the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico; many landed on Isla Mujeres. From there Cuban immigrants traveled to the Texas-Mexico border and found asylum. Many of the Cubans who did not have family in Miami settled in Houston. The term "dusty foot" refers to Cubans immigrating to the U.S. through Mexico. Other migrants arrive in the U.S. crossing the Mona Channel that separates the Dominican Republic from Puerto Rico, the latter being a U.S. Commonwealth. Using smugglers based in the Dominican Republic, migrants make the hazardous journey using rickety fishing boats commonly called "yolas" and set foot on Isla de Mona, a small uninhabited island that is part of Puerto Rico. Once on the island, U.S. Coast Guard patrol boats pick up the migrants and transfer them to Aguadilla where they are processed by U.S. immigration. Beginning with the United States–Cuban Thaw in 2014, anticipation of the end of the wet feet, dry feet policy led to increased numbers of Cuban immigrants. On January 12, 2017, President Barack Obama announced the immediate cessation of the wet feet, dry feet policy. At the same time the Cuban government agreed to accept the return of Cuban nationals.