Given the increase in the number of migrant deaths registered in the Paso del Norte region during fiscal year 2024, members of various immigrant human rights organizations demanded that federal authorities relax asylum restrictions in order to avoid more deaths of foreigners in their attempt to cross the border and enter the United States.
“There is a lot of frustration in knowing that that dead person was a father, a mother, a son or an uncle,” said Alan Lizárraga, spokesperson for the Border Network for Human Rights (BNHR), after lamenting the increase in losses. of life recorded in the last year.
And at the end of fiscal year 2024, the United States Border Patrol closed the statistics with 176 deaths of migrants, 27 more than in 2023 -149-, who lost their lives in desert and mountainous areas, canals, exposure to heat or cold and falls of the wall within lands of the jurisdiction of the El Paso Sector.
Lizárraga said that people come with the hope of improving their quality of life and that of their families. Their goal is to work hard to get ahead, however when they reach the border they suffer and become just another number in the statistics.
For activists, the asylum restrictions implemented by the US Government put applicants for this international right in the hands of the cartels, which is why they implore a change in immigration policy.
They state that if it were not for the rescue services of first responders, Border Patrol agents, firefighters and rescuers, the death toll would be much higher.
The above after President Joe Biden announced at the beginning of the week new, even harsher restrictions for those seeking asylum at the Southern border of the United States, at a time, according to experts, when he is trying to show the electorate that is being strict to guarantee border security.
The new rules, which tighten restrictions announced in June, prohibit authorities from granting asylum to migrants if they believe the border is being overwhelmed.
They indicate that under previous rules, the United States could restrict granting asylum when the number of migrants trying to enter the country at sites located between official border crossings amounts to 2,500 per day. Figures would now have to average less than 1,500 a day for a week for restrictions to be lifted.
The changes, which have already taken effect, will make it much more difficult to lift restrictions and allow people who enter the country through sites located between official border crossings to apply for asylum. This new initiative includes action against all children in that number, while the previous one only included migrant children from Mexico.
Given the high number of deaths, Lizárraga said that this “represents the horrors and cruelty of our immigration system and the operations that are happening on our Southern border.” He highlighted that upon arrival immigrants find a different panorama than what they thought.
At the same time, he once again condemned the actions implemented by Governor Greg Abbott that keep foreigners who enter the country illegally against the wall with his questioned anti-immigrant plan called ‘Operation Lone Star’ (OLS) assisted by agents from the Department of Public Safety. of Texas (DPS) and elements of the Texas National Guard deployed along the Southern border and placing barbed wire.
Aimee Santillán, policy analyst at the Hope Border Institute, also joined the government’s criticism of tightening the asylum policy: “It was very unfortunate to see that number increase in the summer, especially after it was announced the new asylum proclamation in the month of June.”
He noted that the deaths reflect the Government’s insensitivity in putting vulnerable populations at risk, mostly women and children, who see few alternatives to achieve their goal, after fleeing their countries of origin due to the violence and poverty they face.
Activists denounced that criminal organizations abandon migrants who come in groups and who for some reason cannot continue their journey through the desert. Many of them are found in the best of cases, exhausted due to lack of water or injured after suffering a fall or mistreated by the smugglers themselves, but many others are unlucky and die in their attempt.
According to Santillán, expanded legal channels are urgently needed so that migrants can approach the border without having to resort to the so-called ‘polleros’ and, above all, improvements in the CBP One application, which, according to migrants, is deficient.
And in their desperation at not being able to access the application, hundreds of immigrants choose to hire the services of smugglers who keep them in safe houses, first in Mexico and then in the United States, while they manage to transport them to their destinations.
Recently, agents from the Anti-Smuggling Units (ASU) of the El Paso Sector of the Border Patrol, Homeland Security Investigations, El Paso Texas Police Agents and the Texas Department of Public Safety, located a group of smuggled migrants discovered in two safe houses, after they served a warrant on a property, located on Overland Avenue where 72 people were found living in overcrowded and squalid conditions.
Searching the facility, agents located the migrants inside a storage shed with limited airflow, small windows, and piles of trash. Agents identified two of the migrants on the property as caretakers of the residence and both will face human trafficking charges.
During the investigation, agents discovered a second property on Val Verde Street with five additional migrants. The 77 migrants were from Mexico, Honduras, Ecuador, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic, and were in good condition. All migrants held there were processed under Title 8 for deportation.
In background checks at the processing center, one of the arrested individuals from the Dominican Republic was identified in the International Criminal Police Organization database as wanted for murder in his home country.
During fiscal year 2024, El Paso Sector human trafficking interdiction teams have discovered more than 270 safe houses in the sector with 2,663 migrants detained.
“We found a number of problems with the CBP One app when giving appointments at random times: making people wait for long periods of time, language barriers and other factors that the app does not take into account,” said the Hope policy analyst. Border Institute, emphasizing that the death toll this year would have been higher if it were not for the efforts of first responders in El Paso and Sunland Park, NM, among other federal agencies that, despite not having sufficient resources and personnel, prevent the death of more migrants.
Claudio Herrera Baeza, spokesperson for the Border Patrol, El Paso Sector, said that from October 1, 2023 to date, 981 migrants have been rescued in dangerous conditions, so he begged the migrant community not to take those risks that can lead to death. The correct and safe crossing is to do so through the ports of entry to the United States, he assured.
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