Thread: Rising numbers of Central Americans look for a foothold in Tijuana

Rising numbers of Central Americans look for a foothold in Tijuana

Sandra Dibble Contact Reporter


Yefri Montero left Honduras last March with $75 in his pocket, fleeing poverty and gang violence in Tegucigalpa, dreaming of finding work and safe haven in the United States.

But like growing numbers of Central Americans arriving in recent months at the Tijuana-San Diego border, the 19-year-old has decided that for now, he’ll stay in Mexico rather than try to cross.

“The door hasn’t opened, I don’t have family there, and I hear they’re deporting people,” he said one day last week, as he prepared to start a factory job on Monday in Tijuana.

Undeterred by the Trump administration’s increasingly restrictive asylum policies, citizens of Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala continue to arrive in Tijuana to seek admittance to the United States. But migrant advocates in the city are seeing scores of others now looking for ways to stay in Mexico.

Like Montero, many are doing so with humanitarian visas that allow them to work and live in Mexico for one year, with the possibility of extending. Many are qualifying for the status because they have been crime victims in Mexico.

Mexico’s National Migration Institute, INAMI, which issues the humanitarian visas, last week denied a request for an interview, and declined to provide numbers of how many of these visas had been issued, either nationally or at a local level.

But migrant advocates say that dozens, if not hundreds, are staying in Tijuana, often legalizing their status through the visas and other means rather than attempt to enter the United States; others are remaining in the city and working without documents.

“They’re saying, ‘I don’t want to go there just to be deported,’ so it’s better for me to stay in Mexico, and find a job,” said Cristina Reyes, an attorney at the Casa del Migrante, a Tijuana migrant shelter run by Catholic Scalabrinian missionaries.

Since May, the Casa has worked with 54 Central American migrants who are seeking to legalize their status. While Salvadorans often arrive with a document that allows them to be in the country, those from Honduras frequently do not, Reyes said. But in many cases Hondurans qualify for humanitarian visas, almost always because they have been victims of crime, she said.

Also staying in the region are dozens of participants in the Pueblo Sin Fronteras Caravan that drew the ire of President Trump last spring as it made its way across Mexico.

Of those who reached the Tijuana-San Diego border, 248 caravan participants sought asylum in the United States, while another 60 to 80 have opted remain behind, said Gina Garibo, the organization’s special projects director. As of last week, 34 had pending applications with Mexico’s National Migration Institute in Tijuana, she said.

Several caravan members and others interviewed in Tijuana last week said earning dollars and connecting with family in the United States remained powerful lures to crossing the border. But staying in Mexico was preferable to the likelihood of detention and deportation at the hands of U.S. authorities.


Gina Garibo of Pueblo Sin Fronteras speaks during a meeting with members of the caravan who have stayed behind in Tijuana. (David Maung)


Despite Tijuana’s high homicide rates, several Central American migrants said they they felt far safer in Tijuana than areas across from Texas such as Tamaulipas, where they can be targeted by criminal gangs who kidnap and extort them.

Those with work permits have begun finding employment in the city’s numerous maquiladora factories, while others have found jobs in bars and restaurants, on construction sites, in car washes and other places where employers don’t always demand to see their documents.

“There are some places that take advantage of the situation, because they know these people are undocumented, and work extended hours for terrible pay,” Garibo said.

Zonia Alfaro was among several dozen Pueblo Sin Fronteras Caravan members granted humanitarian visas by the Mexican government in Hermosillo, and subsequently moved to Tijuana because she knew there was employment. “Believe me, I have suffered, but here I am with a job,” she said. “I’m not about to leave Tijuana.”

Though sad that she is separated from her teenage children, who remained behind with her mother in Escuintla, Guatemala, she was upbeat Wednesday. She now earns 1,500 pesos, about $80 per week, at a company that manufactures cereal boxes, and has found a room to rent in the Lomas Taurinas neighborhood.
Byron Hernández Flores, 27, a farm worker from southern Honduras who also arrived with the Caravan, has been working two jobs — washing dishes at a sushi restaurant and as a part-time school janitor. His reasons for leaving Honduras were economic, and he knows he stands no chance of remaining if he turns himself in to U.S. authorities.

But as a crime victim in Tijuana — an assailant took a week’s earnings — he expects to soon receive a one-year humanitarian visa.

Soraya Vázquez, a longtime migrant activist, says Central Americans have been coming to Tijuana for years, but typically did not remain in the city for long.

But now more are staying in the city as U.S. immigration policies have been hardening under President Trump.

“People keep coming, they come in small numbers,” said Vázquez, an attorney who is collaborating with the group Espacio Migrante. Because they look similar to Mexicans, and are for the most part Spanish-speaking, their presence often receives little notice, she said.

How the tougher U.S. immigration policies will ultimately play out at the border is still being defined. Jeff Sessions, the U.S. Attorney General, recently has issued new restrictions on asylum applications that make it harder for Central Americans fleeing gangs and domestic violence to even submit petitions.

At the same time, the United States has been pressing Mexico to sign a “safe third country” agreement that would allow U.S. authorities to turn back asylum seekers from Central America and other areas and require them to seek asylum in Mexico.

Even without the agreement, asylum applications received by the Mexican Commission For Refugee Assistance has been skyrocketing — from 1,292 petitions in 2013 to 14,596 last year, with applications expected to to rise even further this year.

“Safe third country or not, I think Mexico is going to be a place where more people are seeking protection regardless of whether there is an agreement with the United States,” said Maureen Meyer, an immigration specialist at the Washington Office on Latin America.

“Given that there is such an anti-refugee climate in the United States, people may increasingly consider Mexico as the place to be at least for the medium to short term.”

Manuel Orellana, 37, said he tried to make a go of it in Honduras after being deported from Fort Lauderdale in 2011 after overstaying his visa. With his savings, he opened a small grocery in San Pedro Sula, but soon became targeted by Mara gang members who demanded extortion payments.

When he refused, leaders ordered him killed, and he went into hiding. In 2013, he tried to leave Honduras, but was deported by Mexican immigration officials after he sought their help for an eye injury.

After two more years in hiding in Honduras, he returned to Mexico, this time asking for asylum. When his petition was granted last year, he bought a bus ticket for Tijuana.

“I came with the intention of crossing, hoping that someone in the United States would understand that my situation is delicate,” he said. “But then I understood, that I wouldn’t be able to cross.”

The onetime engineering student is now working in a car wash, renting a room and volunteering at the Casa del Migrante. By living frugally, he manages to send back $200 a month to support his seven-year-old daughter, his “princesa” who remained behind with her grandparents in Honduras.

“I trust in God that all will be well, but I don’t feel completely safe,” he said. “It’s not like being at home.”

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