Julián Castro’s effort to escort a group of vulnerable asylum-seekers who have been forced to wait out their cases in Mexico back to the U.S. helped put a human face to the Trump administration’s policy. Customs and Border Protection’s move later that same day to again kick them out and return them to dangerous conditions showed the policy’s cruelty and inhumanity.
The 2020 Democratic presidential candidate had on Monday traveled to Matamoros, Mexico, to escort 12 people, including LGBTQ asylum-seekers and asylum-seekers with disabilities, back to the U.S., arguing that they’re members of vulnerable populations who should have been exempt from Migrant Protection Protocols, also known as Remain in Mexico. Castro was successful in convincing U.S. officers to reassess the cases, and the 12 reentered—but only for a short while.
“Hours after we were told LGBT and disabled asylum seekers would have their cases heard,” Castro tweeted, “they have been returned to Mexico. By law, these migrants are supposed to be exempt from the Remain in Mexico policy—but Customs and Border Protection had decided to ignore their due process. Outrageous.” The Texas Civil Rights Project, which invited Castro to the border, said, "If these people … do not meet the criteria for 'vulnerable populations,' then the 'vulnerable' exemptions in 'Remain in Mexico' are lip service.”
“Daniela, a 22-year-old lesbian from Cuba, who was among the LGBT group escorted by Castro said she was disappointed and demoralized after being sent back to Matamoros,” BuzzFeed News’ Adolfo Flores reported. “Now more than ever I'm convinced MPP is not about protecting us,” Daniela said. “It's about wearing you down so you don't fight your asylum case in court.”
Flores reported, “The Department of Homeland Security has said vulnerable populations may be excluded from the policy on a case-by-case basis, including immigrants who are ‘more likely than not to be persecuted’ in Mexico,” but the administration has also said a lot of things that turned out to be lies, such as claiming that Mexico would provide returned asylum-seekers “with all appropriate humanitarian protections for the duration of their stay.”
In reality, only a small number of these vulnerable families have found space in shelters. Late last month, leading immigration attorney David Leopold said that in Juarez, only 1,000 of about 20,000 asylum-seekers have found somewhere to stay. Even then, they’ve become targets of armed kidnappers looking for people with U.S. relatives to extort. The rest are in the streets, in encampments, in, as Castro later said, “squalor.”
“They’re up to more than 1,000 people there in tents right on the other side of the border,” the candidate told Mother Jones. “Plus, Matamoros is the newest site; you have more than 3,000 people in Nuevo Laredo and many more in Tijuana. The scale of the desperation is growing quickly as the policy expands. This is a humanitarian disaster that should be ended immediately.”
Nearly 50,000 people so far have been forced out under this policy, and that number—and desperation—will only grow. The forcible separation of families at the border has been a humanitarian disaster that, rightfully, has dominated headlines throughout the Trump presidency. But perhaps because a large part of Remain in Mexico’s misery has been happening outside our borders, it’s been a disaster that too few are talking about. It’s what the administration would certainly like. Don’t let it happen.
