REYNOSA, Mexico (AP) – In one of Mexico’s most notorious cities for organized crime, migrants are expelled from the United States all night long, exhausted from the journey, disillusioned with not getting a chance to apply for asylum and a crossroads about where they can go. go next.
Marisela Ramirez, who was returned to Reynosa around 4 a.m. on Thursday, brought her 14-year-old son and left five other children – one just 8 months old – in Guatemala because she couldn’t afford to pay smugglers more money . Faced with another painful choice, she tended to send her son across the border alone to settle with a sister in Missouri, aware that the United States allows unaccompanied children to seek asylum.
“We are in God’s hands,” said Ramirez, 30, in a bare park with dying grass and a large gazebo in the center that serves as a shelter for migrants.
Lesdny Suyapa Castillo, 35, said through tears that she would return to Honduras with her 8-year-old daughter, who was breathing heavily under the arbor with her eyes partially open and flying to her face. After not paying for three months as a nurse in Honduras during the pandemic, she wants steady work in the US to send an older daughter to medical school. A friend in New York encouraged her to try again.
“I’d love to go, but a mother doesn’t want to see her child in this condition,” she said after being dropped in Reynosa at 10pm.
The decisions unfold amid what Border Patrol officials say is an extraordinarily high 30-day average of 5,000 daily encounters with migrants. Unaccompanied children are allowed to stay in the US to apply for asylum, while nearly all single adults are deported to Mexico under pandemic rules that deny them the opportunity to seek humanitarian protection.
Families with children under the age of 7 are allowed to stay in the US to apply for asylum, a Border Patrol official who spoke to reporters on Friday on condition of anonymity. Others in families – just 300 out of 2,200 on Thursday – are being expelled.
In Reynosa, a city of 700,000, many migrants are being turned back after being expelled from the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, the busiest corridor for illegal crossings. The Border Patrol has said that the vast majority of migrants are driven to Mexico after less than two hours in the United States to limit the spread of COVID-19, meaning many arrive after dark.
In normal times, migrants are returned to Mexico under bilateral agreements which limit deportations to daytime hours and the greatest crossings. But under pandemic rule, Mexicans and citizens of Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras could be expelled to Mexico all night and in smaller cities.
Border Patrol Chief Rodney Scott acknowledged in an interview last year that agreements restricting hours and locations for deportations have been “on paper” suspended, but said US authorities are trying to accommodate Mexican officials’ wishes. The US also coordinates with non-governmental organizations.
“I would never sit here and look at you and say that Tijuana is not dangerous, Juarez not dangerous, Tamaulipas (state) is not dangerous,” said Scott. “Much of it, however, is like any other American city. There are certain American cities where there are parts that are very dangerous and there are parts that are not. “
Tamaulipas, to which Reynosa belongs, is one of five Mexican states not allowed to visit, according to the US State Department. An American travel advice says heavily armed criminal groups in Reynosa patrol marked and unmarked vehicles.
More than 100 fathers, mothers, and children who were expelled at night waited in a square outside the Mexican border crossing at dawn on Saturday, many exasperated by the experience and afraid to venture into the city. Several said they had left Central America in the past two months because they could finally afford it, but information about President Joe Biden’s more immigrant-friendly policies contributed to their decisions. Some reported paying smugglers as much as $ 10,000 per person to reach US territory.
Michel Maeco, who sold his land in Guatemala to pay smugglers $ 35,000 for his family of five, including children aged 15, 11 and 7, said he was going home after a 25-day journey. He left Guatemala after hearing “on the news” that Biden would allow families to enter the United States.
Maeco’s family was sent to the streets of Reynosa at 3 a.m. on Saturday.
“Presumably (Biden) was going to help migrants, but I don’t see anything,” said Maeco, 36.
A Honduran woman who refused to give her name said she had left two months ago because her home was destroyed in Tropical Storm Eta and she learned that Biden would ‘open the border for 100 days’ – unaware that the 100-day moratorium on deportations of the president suspended by courts, does not cover newcomers. She planned to send her 9-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son alone to live with their aunt in Alabama while she returns to Honduras.
Underlining the dangers, the Border Patrol said Friday that a 9-year-old Mexican girl died crossing the Rio Grande near the town of Eagle Pass.
Mexico’s migrant protection agency, Grupos Beta, convinced many people arriving at night to be taken by bus to a remote shelter. The crowds in the nearby park had diminished from a few hundred migrants days ago.
Felicia Rangel, founder of the Sidewalk School, which provides educational opportunities to asylum-seeking children in Mexican border towns, sees the benefits of a filthy migrant camp like nearby Matamoros, which has recently closed.
“If they get a foothold in this gazebo, this will be a camp,” she said as a church distributed chicken soup, bread and water to migrants for breakfast. “They don’t want another camp in their country.”
Martin Vasquez is one of the migrants who will stay for the time being. The 19-year-old was expelled from school after divorcing his 12-year-old brother, who was considered an unaccompanied child and will almost certainly be released to a Florida grandfather. He said he was inclined to return to Guatemala, where he worked for a moving company, but wanted to wait “to see what the news says.”