Guatemala mother tells U.S. court she'd rather be sent home than wait in Mexico
Guatemala mother tells U.S. court she'd rather be sent home than wait in Mexico any longer
Aaron Montes, El Paso Times
Published 7:42 p.m. MT May 10, 2019
Karla held one of her sons and sobbed as she asked a U.S. immigration court to let her go back to Guatemala.
On Friday, the mother of two was in front of Judge Nathan Herbert for the second time since she first entered the United States on March 25 — less than a week after the U.S. Department of Homeland Security implemented its Migrant Protection Protocols in El Paso.
Under the policy, commonly known as Remain In Mexico, immigrants who cross into El Paso are sent to Juárez, Mexico, to await their U.S. asylum hearings.
Karla has been living in Juárez for almost two months.
She was among a group of 14 people from five families who were before Herbert on Friday, the first group of immigrants in El Paso to have their second hearings.
They had all appeared before Herbert on April 17 and 18.
The El Paso Times is only using first names of immigrants seeking asylum in court.
Herbert offered all of them more time to find an attorney, but Karla declined. She would represent herself because a lawyer was too expensive, she said.
Herbert found that Karla had entered El Paso without proper documentation and outside of a port of entry, where it is legal to cross and request asylum. She still had an opportunity to request asylum in the U.S. or to ask to be allowed to wait in the United States while her status was decided, but she gave up on her chances to stay.
More: With U.S. hearings months away, migrants back in Juárez with no place to stay, few options
More: More than 670 undocumented immigrants cross border in El Paso Sector in less than 24 hours
“I want to go back to my country,” she told Herbert when he asked where she wanted to be sent.
Herbert asked her several times whether she was afraid to return to Guatemala.
She said she was, but she was more afraid to be sent back to Juárez.
“If something happens to me here, I don’t have anyone,” she said of life in Juárez. “If they do something to me, my children have someone to stay with" in Guatemala.
Herbert also asked her several times whether she wanted to ask Homeland Security for permission to await her asylum hearing in the U.S., but she said she was ready to go home.
Herbert issued the order for removal, making Karla and her children the first immigrants to be ordered removed from El Paso under the new MPP policy.
About the MPP policy
According to Mexican officials, more than 1,200 immigrants have been returned to Juárez to await their asylum hearings since the MPP program began March 19 in El Paso.
Of those, more than 100 immigrants have attended their initial hearings and about 35 have missed theirs.
This week, a court ruled the Trump administration can continue to send immigrants back to Mexico while the legality of the policy is decided.
In Herbert's immigration court Friday, only two lawyers were representing migrants. A single woman from Guatemala had retained a private attorney who called in to the hearing from Dedham, Massachusetts. A woman from Honduras and her child were represented by a lawyer with the Las Cruces-based Catholic Charities of Southern New Mexico.
Karla, her two sons, and the eight other immigrants were in court without attorneys.
Herbert granted four of the families more time to seek legal representation, but they will have to do so from Juárez.
Trouble finding attorneys
The immigrants told Herbert that during the weeks they had been in Juárez they had tried to find attorneys but that lawyers were either too expensive or too busy.
“They say they can’t help me because they have too many cases," said Sandra, a mother from Guatemala.
Since the MPP hearings began in El Paso, immigration attorneys from the nonprofit-sector have worked to represent as many immigrants as possible who are returned to Mexico. The only private attorneys who have represented immigrants under the MPP policy have been from out of town, and they call in to the hearings.
Danielle Escontrias, an immigration attorney from Las Cruces' Catholic Charities, said her nonprofit has struggled to handle the number of immigrants requesting assistance.
She said she and other lawyers have also found it difficult to consult with clients returned to Mexico.
“It’s impossible,” Escontrias said.
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