On the one day -up Mexican border, a few immigrants remain

On the eve of the deadline of President Trump to impose a customs tariff on Mexico, it is difficult to miss one thing on the Mexican side of the border: the immigrants went.

In some day, some of the most crowded sections along the border – Seydad Khuraiz, Tijuana, Matamorus – shelters that were now outperforming a few families. Gardens, hotels and vacant buildings that are once filled with people from all over the world stand empty.

On the same border, where immigrants once sleep in camps on a 30 -foot wall, there are still only sunken clothes and shoes, and the toothpaste wrapped and water bottles.

“All that is over,” said Reverend William Morton, a missionary at the Cathedral of Siodad Khwariz, who offers free meals for immigrants. “No one can cross.”

Last week, US Secretary of Homeland Security, Christie Nom, Declare Those customs and border protection have arrested only 200 people on the southern border on Saturday by-the lowest number for one day in more than 15 years.

Mr. Trump attributed the crackdown on illegal immigration of amazing numbers, so he also announced that he would do Send thousands of other combat forces To the borders to stop what he calls the invasion.

But according to analysts, Mexico’s private movements to restrict immigration in the past year – not only on the border but all over the country – have resulted in indispensable results. In February, the Trump administration said it would stop for a month for a month, imposing a 25 percent tariff on Mexican exports, challenging the government to increase immigration and fentanel flow across the border.

This progress was placed in a much stronger negotiating position than it was when Mr. Trump threatened customs duties first, during his first term.

Ariel J. Ruiz Soto and Andrew Ciley, analysts at the Institute of Immigration Policy, a non -party research center, “Mexico has a new crane compared to 2019”. a report. They said that Mexico’s cooperation made it “indispensable” to the United States.

In recent years, the Mexican government has greatly climbed to checks on immigration. I have created checkpoints along migrant roads, imposing restrictions on the visa, and migratory convoys and people who arrived from places such as Venezuela to remote corners in southern Mexico to prevent them from reaching the American border. All this has greatly reduced the number of migrants on the border.

Since last spring, it was the Mexican authorities Carcate more people From their American counterparts every month. Now, the numbers on the border fell to almost anything.

“We no longer have significant flows from the arriving people – they decreased by 90 percent,” said Enrique Sirano Escobar, who is leading the Chihua state office in charge of immigrants in Khuraiz last week.

Shelter operators say immigrants who advance to the border are no longer trying to enter the United States.

Father Morton said in Khuraiz: “They know that they cannot cross.” “All underground holes, tunnels, and holes in the wall have already closed them – they are much more difficult.”

Empty shelters

In the Mexican border cities, the scene in migrant shelters is the same: tables that sit at the time of the meal, two floors, unused.

Even before Mr. Trump took office, the number of people arrested in an attempt to cross the border was Significant decreaseAccording to US government data.

Many of those waiting in the border cities have dates through One CBPShelter operators say that the application that allowed people to make asylum dates with the authorities instead of crossing the border.

After Mr. Trump canceled the application on his first day in his post, people surrendered a few days later and went to the south to Mexico or even to the southern border, as said Reverend Juan Vierro, the priest in the good Samaritan shelter in Siodad Khuraiz.

In a shelter in Matamorus, his name translates to their help to victory, there is still a handful of Venezuelan women and their children, according to its managers.

In Tijuana, in a shelter complex in the border wall show, the 2000 youth movement, which was once hundreds of nationalities, is now only 55 years, according to its director, Jose Maria Lara.

They are the same people who have been there since the inauguration of Mr. Trump.

Mr. Lara said: “There was the same number.” It includes people from Venezuela, Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Colombia and Guatemala, as well as Mexican immigrants from states that are dangerous to return to it, such as Michocan.

There are no numbers available to the number of migrants such as those who may live in border shelters, hotels and rented rooms, and spend their time.

.

“We will wait to see if God touches the heart of Mr. Trump,” said a 26 -year -old woman from Venezuela, who asked her to get to know her only with her first name, Maria Elena, who is sitting with her 7 -year -old son in the cataract. In Siodad Khwariz.

Guardmen on the border

In response to the demands of Mr. Trump last month, the President of Mexico, Claudia ShinbomHe sent 10,000 national guards to the border and sent hundreds of forces to the state of Cenaloa, a main center for trafficking in fentanel.

Officials and those who work with migrants are divided if the forces, several hundred of which began to appear in and around the border city over the past month, are divided into an impact on the illegal border crossings.

At the end of the border wall between Tijuana and San Diego, California, the National Guard created large tents on the Mexican side, in an area called NIDO de laguilas. The authorities say that the smugglers who benefit from the hills are very slope and the lack of police to lead migrants to California, about 15 miles from the center of Tijuana, have been used a long time ago by wolves, and smugglers who benefit from the highly declining hills and the lack of police to lead migrants to California.

The goalkeeper also put checkpoints in spots up and down on the border.

In Tijuana, Jose Moreno Mina, a coalition spokesman for the defense of immigrants, said the presence of the guard was a great deterrent to immigration, as well as the deportation of Mr. Trump promised in the United States.

Mr. Moreno said: “This does not mean that they will not continue to come.” “It is just a temporary stop, perhaps, to see better conditions.”

But in the state of Tamolibas, where more than 700 guards arrived last month in places like Matamorus, the guards do not seem to scream with immigration, the residents say. They seem to focus on the bridge in the United States, while migrants are now seeking to enter through the desert or other rural areas.

In Sidad Khuraiz, where hundreds of guards were also sent in early February, the forces and military personnel were stopping cars to inspect them, and searching for border tunnels.

Father Morton said: “They have searches at night, on the street.” “There is more here, apparently to stop fentanel, but I doubt that they know his place.” He said that they mainly stopped young people from young people who were driving expected cars or a tattoo, and created an environment of “low -density conflict.”

The real work of curbing immigration was happening away from the northern border of Mexico.

In the far south in Mexico, in Tabsola, a few immigrants enter. Recently, shelters have 1,000 people, or so, according to operators. Waiting for visas that allow them to go north, and separate if they try to form convoys, all of these immigrants are banned.

Many weigh their options. Some even asked the Mexican government They deported them to flights Return to their country.

Stay in Mexico

Immigrants who are now sitting on the American border are generally those who come from places they cannot return to.

“They cannot return,” said Reverend Francisco Gonzalez, head of a shelter network in Khuraiz.

He said that while the 12 shelters that included only 440 people last week after they were often filled with their 1,200 people in recent years, people who arrive in a longer period.

Mr. Gonzalez said that some began filling the models to gain asylum in Mexico, for fear that they will be arrested and deported if they had no legal status.

“We still have faith and we hope that Trump will recover at some point in his madness,” said Jordan Garcia, a former mining worker from Venezuela.

Mr. Garcia carried his baby, Reina Catalia, through the dangerous forest corridor known as Dibern Gap When she was seven months old. Now the temporary house of the family consists of two bunk beds in a shelter of Mr. Gonzalez on the outskirts of Siodad Khwariz, covered with luxury blankets for privacy.

But the shelters on the border began to close. In Siodad Khwariz, 34 were open in November. By last month, this number decreased to 29. Shelter operators say there are no much fewer expatriates, but rather they are losing support from international groups such as the United Nations International Migration Office and UNICEF, which relied on frozen external aid under the leadership of Mr. Trump.

Before the new American administration, “there were more people, and there was more support,” said Olivia Santiago Renters, a volunteer in one of the shelters that we are going. “Now, she said,” Everyone here lives with uncertainty. “

Reports previously contributed Rocío Gallegos From Siodad Khwariz, Mexico; Allen CorpusFrom Tijuana Enrique Lerma from Matamorus; And Lucía Trejo from Tapachula.