CARAVAN ASYLUM- SEEKERS IGNORING U. S. WARNINGS
TIJUANA, Mexico — U. S. immigration lawyers are telling Central Americans in a caravan of asylum- seekers that traveled through Mexico to the border with San Diego that they face possible separation from their children and detention for many months. They say they want to prepare them for the worst possible outcome.
“We are the bearers of horrible news,” Los Angeles lawyer Nora Phillips said during a break from legal workshops for the migrants at three Tijuana locations where about 20 lawyers gave free information and advice. “That’s what good attorneys are for.”
The Central Americans, many traveling as families, on Sunday will test the Trump administration’s tough rhetoric criticizing the caravan when the migrants begin seeking asylum by turning themselves in to border inspectors at San Diego’s San Ysidro border crossing, the nation’s busiest.
President Donald Trump and members of his Cabinet have been tracking the caravan, calling it a threat to the U. S. since it started March 25 in the Mexican city of Tapachula, near the Guatemala border. They have promised a stern, swift response.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions called the caravan “a deliberate attempt to undermine our laws and overwhelm our system,” pledging to send more immigration judges to the border to resolve cases if needed.
Kenia Elizabeth Avila, 35, appeared shaken after the volunteer attorneys told her Friday that temperatures may be cold in temporary holding cells and that she could be separated from her three children, ages 10, 9 and 4.
But she in said an interview that returning to her native El Salvador would be worse. She fled for reasons she declined to discuss.
“If they’re going to separate us for a few days, that’s better than getting myself killed in my country,” she said.
Since Congress failed to agree on a broad immigration package in February, administration officials have made it a legislative priority to end what they call “legal loopholes” and “catch- and- release” policies that allow asylumseekers to be released from custody while their claims wind through the courts in cases that can last for year.
The lawyers who went to Tijuana denied coaching any of the roughly 400 people in the caravan who recently arrived in Tijuana, camping out in shelters near some of the city’s seedier bars and bordellos.
Nefi Hernandez, who planned to seek asylum with his wife and infant daughter, worried he could be kept in custody away from his daughter. But his spirits lifted when he learned he might be released with an ankle bracelet.
Hernandez, 24, said a gang in his hometown of San Pedro Sula, Honduras, threatened to kill him and his family if he did not sell drugs.
Jose Cazares, 31, said he faced death threats in the northern Honduran city of Yoro because a gang member suspected of killing the mother of his children learned one of Cazares’ sons reported the crime to police.
“One can always make up for lost time with a child, but if they kill him, you can’t,” he said.