Thread: More Mexicans are staying put

More Mexicans are staying put
CRACKDOWN APPEARS TO BE STEMMING TIDE
By Traci Carl
ASSOCIATED PRESS

TECATE, Mexico --Mexican shelters, usually the last stop for northbound migrants, are filling with southbound deportees. Fewer migrants are crossing in the wind-swept deserts along an increasingly fortified border. Far to the north, fields are empty at harvest time as workplace raids become more common.

Mexicans are increasingly giving up on the American dream and staying home, and the federal crackdown on undocumented workers announced Friday should discourage even potential migrants from taking the risks as the United States purges itself of its illegal population.

U.S. border agents detained 55,545 illegal migrants jumping over border walls, walking through the desert or swimming across the Rio Grande between October and June. That's down 38 percent for the entire border compared with the same period a year before.

U.S. and Mexican officials say increased border security, including 6,000 National Guard troops, remote surveillance technology and drone planes, have thwarted smugglers who had succeeded for years at beating the system.

Migrants also say they feel Americans are increasingly hostile toward immigrants.

"It's the discrimination," said George Guevara, 28, who was deported to Tijuana last month after living in the U.S. for 18 years. "It's making people step back. It's just too much of a risk. It's better to be out here."

Guevara, who speaks perfect English and has only distant memories of Mexico, was living at a Tijuana migrant shelter filled with deportees, many of whom are Mexican-born but find themselves in a country that is foreign to them.

"I barely remember living here," Guevara said. "But I see this as an opportunity. I'm going to go back to Guadalajara to see my family and forget what happened."

While some migrants try to set up new lives, others are caught between two worlds. Salvador Perez has a pregnant wife and three small children in Bakersfield, Calif., where he worked on a pistachio ranch before he was deported. He has tried to cross the rocky, snake-infested mountains near Tecate three times this summer to get back to them, but he has failed each time.

"I want to try again, but I'm scared something will happen," Perez said.

The biggest drop in Border Patrol detentions -- a 68 percent decrease -- was in the remote, heat-seared desert surrounding Yuma, Ariz., once popular with smugglers. Border Patrol spokesman Jeremy Chappell credits the additional troops and tougher security.

"Where an alien before was able to sneak across, now he has the National Guard watching him," Chappell said.

The only area that has seen an increase -- 1.5 percent -- is the San Diego sector, which runs along the California border and includes the harsh, roadless desert surrounding Tecate. The Border Patrol has responded with helicopters and increased intelligence from detained migrants.

Crossing there requires hiking as much as 6 miles, scrambling over or under the border fence, then walking some more, usually in the dead of night. The region is difficult to patrol, making it one of the few places migrants think they still can get through.

Deportations also are up for illegal immigrants who have lived in the States for years. Some are caught for minor infractions, such as a burned-out headlight. Others are rounded up in workplace raids that the Bush administration has vowed to intensify.

The new measures announced Friday will force employers to fire anyone who cannot prove their Social Security numbers are legitimate.

http://www.kentucky.com/267/story/147903.html

Migrants also say they feel Americans are increasingly hostile toward immigrants.

That should read "illegal aliens" not immigrants. There is no problem with those that follow the law. The problem is with those that strain our resources with their selfish desire to better themselves at the risk of breaking laws and causing those that do things the right way to be punished.

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