Jennifer Harbury
Dear Friends:
We are concerned that matters are moving swiftly in a negative direction with regards to the refugee crisis on our Mexican border. Because matters have been changing so quickly, and there are different groups being treated differently, there is a lot of confusion as to who is being held where and under what conditions. I would like to share the following collective information and proposals. As discussed below our key demands will be temporary protected status for the refugees, attorney representation for all minors, and access to the “warehouses” where the children are being held. This is just a starting point. Please send us all comments, corrections, or suggestions!
Unaccompanied Minors:
1. The unaccompanied minors are in the legal custody of DHHS (Office of Refugee Resettlement). Because they are minors, the government is not allowed to just release them the streets. They are therefore being warehoused at Border Patrol facilities until they can be sent to the larger DHHS/ORR sponsored shelters. The Border Patrol facilities are the hideously over crowed and under supplied locations we have been seeing the photographs: caged children lying on the floors and wrapped only in light weight foil blankets. We are not allowed in to see them or bring food, clothing, blankets etc. Church and civic groups need to be allowed entry with reasonable supplies at once.
2. The children are normally only be held in the Border Patrol facilities for a short time, but because of the huge influx it is taking way too long to process them, so they suffer for days in really bad conditions. Once initially processed, they are sent to the ORR sponsored shelters, where conditions are much better. Those shelters try to reunite the kids with family members as possible. Otherwise they remain at the shelter or might be sent to foster care while their deportation hearings proceed. They are not entitled to lawyers (they can hire them or accept volunteers) and many do not have anyone to help or advise them. Obviously, a terrorized fourteen year is not easily going to chat with ICE officers or a Judge in an open curt room about the gangs in his or her homeland. They are refugees and they need help.
3. The biggest problem is that there are now far too many kids for the established shelters, so huge new ones are being hastily organized. This is really bad. We already have a lawsuit going for the 2006-2007 sexual and physical abuse of a dozen unaccompanied minors in such an ORR sponsored shelter. Although Know Your Rights groups have managed to keep a close eye on these facilities in recent years, the larger new facilities present all of the conditions that lead to abuse before: A very large institutional population, and hurriedly hired and trained care-takers, many of whom have only prison guard, military and boot camp experience. State regulations require a week or so of training, but this is nowhere near enough to prepare them for refugee/ child welfare services. Starting a huge facility at the Air Force base in San Antonio, for example, is a terrible idea.
In short, this combination of conditions can and will lead to abuse. The Know Your Rights, or VERA groups are terrific but no one else is allowed into the shelters as the number of minors soar. Worse yet, like all child abuse victims, most of the minors will be threatened with deportation or worse by the perpetrators. We need to insist on far greater access rights for church and civic groups to enter, meet with the children one on one, help provide positive activities, and any other needed assistance. The less the access, the greater the risk of abuse.
Mothers with Children
4. The mothers and babies struggling across the border are also sent to the far over crowded Border Patrol facilities we are seeing in the photographs. If the women have a relative who can pre- pay the bus ticket, then ICE is letting many of them go, with a date to show up for their hearings. These women with their children are then dumped at the bus stations. Many are in very bad shape, both because of the terrible journey, and also because of the unfit food and unbearably cold conditions in the border shelters. Some of the mothers are telling us that a number of exhausted women cannot breast feed their kids. In the ICE facilities they don’t get Nido formula…just a cup of milk in the morning with an apple and what sounds like a fast food egg muffin or congealed pizza slice. The smaller kids cannot eat this. Everyone is getting sick from poor food and the cold. The ones I have met with have not really eaten for several days.
5. The Churches have jumped in and are doing wonderful work with the women and their children left at the bus stations:
Anunciation House in El Paso has for years now run an amazing support network for all immigrants, and is very actively assisting with this now. In McAllen, the Sacred Heart Church is a block from the bus station. They now have a huge set up. Women and children are brought to the activities center where there are doctors and nurses if anyone is ill… and they are given clean clothes, hygienic supplies, showers, dinner, pampers, and other needed supplies for the road. There are now some tents and clean cots for those who must spend the night. La Posada in San Benito is receiving 3-10 women a day from the Harlingen area and assisting them before they head north. Deacon Roberto Cano of the Immaculate Conception Church,956-546-3178 in Brownsville is just getting services started up as well, but there is no assistance after 9 pm and it is a fledgling project. Men are not appearing, and I think are still detained. Adults with children who are not their own are not being released either.
6. Soon the political backlash will shut down this release of mothers and children. Even those who have been released are still subject to deportation, and most have no idea of their rights.
OTHERS:
7. Others arriving with children not their own are not being released at all. Without lawyers, many will be sent back to the drug wars they are fleeing. This raises some very serious international law questions. As illustrated by the case of Laura S. (para.9).
COMING BACKLASH:
8. The Obama administration and others are of course talking about sending everyone home…and using expedited procedures at the border to expel people more quickly. The procedures that can be used so far are very dangerous: if the person is caught within the 100 mile zone and has been in the US less that 14 days, the Border Patrol Agent can immediately send them back across into Mexico, UNLESS they claim that they are in danger. As noted above, virtually all refugees fleeing the drug war know better than to say anything at all about the cartels. People arriving from Honduras, Guatemala, Salvador or Mexico should be permitted to sit down with lawyers first and learn about the rights and protections available to them.
9. A tragic example of how expedited removal can go very wrong, is the case of Laura S. which we are working on in South Texas. Laura was a young mother who was long battered by her former boyfriend, who was working with the cartels in Mexico. She finally filed charges against him in the Texas courts, and obtained protective orders. He returned to Mexico, enraged and making it clear he would kill her as soon as he got the chance. Border Patrol picked her up with three friends one evening and sent her back across to Mexico before dawn, with no hearing and no lawyer. She was not eligible for extradited removal, as she had lived in Texas for years, and there were many ways she could have obtained relief from an immigration Judge. She repeatedly told the officers she would be killed within the week if they deported her and begged and wept all the way to the bridge. She was found dead in a burning car days later.
10. The solution is to provide more protection for these refugees, not less.
Proposed Actions: So far there is a lot of support building for the following actions:
A. DEMAND TEMPORARY PROTECTED STATUS, or TPS for Honduras, Guatemalans, Mexicans (at least the most violent Mexican border- states), and Salvadorans. This is a clean, simple, and tested solution. Although imperfect, it will serve as a “cease fire” while better solutions are worked through. It will also respond to the current demands to just send everyone back right now. We will be issuing draft petitions for the White House shortly, as well as letters to email urgently to all Senate offices. The more church and human rights organizations that can visit the White House and insist on this measure, the better.
TPS has been granted before to Haitians, Salvadorans and Nicaraguans. The cut- off date would begin as of the date President Obama signs the papers. It does not have to go through Congress. Everyone already here could stay and also work. However, the status temporary, so in a year or so the dangers in the home countries will be re- evaluated and people could be sent back then.
This is tried and true. It will in fact save the government huge amounts of time and money by swiftly resolving people’s status, releasing them, and allowing them to work and support themselves, instead of being detained in government sponsored centers. It will greatly relieve the huge back up of cases in the immigration courts. It would also slow the surge if people understand there is a specific cut- off date.
B. All minors should be provided with an attorney.
C. Church, human rights and civic groups should be granted immediate access to Border Patrol ware-houses as well as ORR sponsored shelters. Reasonable provisions of food and blankets should be permitted at the BP centers.
D. We need to get the United Nations involved…We are finding out who the correct officials would be and what we need to do to get them invited down here. We will also report back on potential inter American Commission assistance.
Jennifer Harbury
[shared with permission, and please share further]
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