Thread: Deportation sends many more home to Guatemala

Deportation sends many more home to Guatemala

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07252/81 ... nworld.xml
Sunday, September 09, 2007

GUATEMALA CITY -- Every day, more Guatemalans are returning home -- but not by choice.

Amid a highly charged public debate over illegal immigration, the U.S. government has significantly increased deportations to this Central American country of 12 million people. Hundreds land daily at the Guatemala City airport.

In 2006, 18,305 deportees returned to Guatemala from the United States. As many as 15,000 have already returned this year, and the Guatemalan government expects that number to grow to 24,000 by Jan. 1.

"It's a very complicated situation," said Pablo Garcia, director of the Center for Migrant Attention. "The country is not ready for a massive deportation."

Last year, the Guatemalan government opened the center to help deportees ease the process of resettling in their home country. Some had lived in the United States for years and were picked up by police for traffic violations or bigger infractions. Others were captured while crossing the border.

Michael Keegan, a spokesman for U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, said his agency has increased its enforcement efforts in recent years. It now has about 70 "fugitive operation teams" that track down immigrants who have violated deportation orders.

As of July 23, the United States had deported 174,776 immigrants. The total for 2006 was 197,117.

The United States transports immigrants back to Central America in a fleet of four government planes. In August, 23 flights landed in Guatemala, carrying 2,120 deportees, according to the migrant center. Most deportees were men, but there were 288 women.

Officials from the center meet deportees as they exit the planes, offering food -- a chicken sandwich, juice and a cookie. They provide them with a free phone call to family members. The government also gives limited help with the cost of reaching their homes.

Mr. Garcia said his office also tries to help deportees find work. But the center's resources are limited, and Guatemala, with a per-capita income of about $4,300, lacks jobs that can replace the wages of immigrants used to the U.S. labor market.

"There just aren't the same opportunities here," Mr. Garcia said.

Some deportees try to return immediately to the United States, citing the need to repay "loans" to smugglers who helped them cross over the first time.

Immigrants who lived in the United States for many years often face difficult transitions. One 16-year-old deportee had not lived in Guatemala since she was an infant. She spoke almost no Spanish, Mr. Garcia said, but her only relative in Guatemala was a grandmother who lived in a rural area and spoke no English.

Some return with drug addictions and debilitating alcoholism. Others become involved with gangs.

About 60 percent of the 1.4 million Guatemalans living in the United States are illegal immigrants, according to estimates from the Guatemalan government.

A full-scale deportation would be a "disaster" for the country, argues Juan Garcia, of Migrant Action Committee in Rhode Island, home to about 45,000 Guatemalans.

"Imagine what happened with Hurricane Katrina," said Mr. Garcia, an immigrant from Guatemala City. "That would happen in Guatemala."

-- Jerome L. Sherman

sorry chief... no sympathy from us here... we are protecting our wives and kids from preditors as well as DUI's from ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS

We would like to give you a few overly paid politicians Bush, Rice, Rove, Kyle, Kennedy and numerous others ... if you can take them in as a goofy immigrant status we will gladly pay you lots of moola to put up with there goony goo goo AS_

OK, I'm a little confused. Did they send a 16 year old BY HERSELF back to Guatamala?? Why weren't her parents deported with her? Something is fishy here. I can't see the US Government sending a MINOR ALONE back to their home country, without their parents, with a distant grandmother living there. There's more to this story than just another SOB story!

TexasGal

Michael Keegan, a spokesman for U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, said his agency has increased its enforcement efforts in recent years. It now has about 70 "fugitive operation teams" that track down immigrants who have violated deportation orders.

As of July 23, the United States had deported 174,776 immigrants. The total for 2006 was 197,117.

Notice that Michael Keegan's quote ends and a line added that says he tracks down immigrants. ICE doesn't hunt down immigrants, but deals in illegal aliens.
The United States deported immigrants? Yeah sure!