Thread: In Tijuana, deported migrants struggle to survive

In Tijuana, deported migrants struggle to survive

By OMAR MILLAN, Associated Press – 15 hours ago

TIJUANA, Mexico (AP) — After 15 years of installing marble in homes in Escondido, California, Porfirio Perez was caught without a driver's license during a February traffic stop and deported.

Now the 42-year-old just tries to survive in this sprawling industrial border city, 1,500 miles (2,400 kilometers) from his birthplace of Puebla in central Mexico.

He is among hundreds of deportees who are stuck in Tijuana, which sits across from San Diego, California. Some don't have the money for a bus trip home. Some are waiting to cross the border again. And some have mental problems or addictions.

Like many of the other 350 people living in and around a section of the Rio Tijuana canal that separates the two cities, Perez doesn't have the Mexican documents he would need to get a job, or the permanent addresses to get the documents.

"I'm looking for work here but I can't get any because I don't have papers or a voter ID," Perez said. "It's a real awful change, you know. There, when I was hungry I'd go to a restaurant. Here, you eat if you can get it. You walk back and forth, looking out for the police."

During the day the deportees look for work, wash cars at intersections or flee Mexican policewho consider them a nuisance. At night they take refuge in drainage tunnels feeding the canal, beneath bridges or in shacks made of wood, cloth and plastic a few feet from the rusty barrier that separates the country of their birth from the country where they worked years for a better life.

The Padre Chava soup kitchen in Tijuana has offered 900 free breakfasts a day for the last 12 years, along with haircuts and medical services. About 80 percent of the people it serves have been repatriated from the United States.

"Society has to turn to the reality that deportees and migrants are a part of our city," said the Rev. Ernesto Hernandez Ruiz, kitchen director. "We can't consider them a plague ... they're human beings in a difficult situation who need a hand."

An average of 254 migrants were deported to Tijuana every day from the United States in the first half of this year, according to Mexico's National Migration Institute. That's down from 2010, when an average of 366 people were deported every day over the same period.

During the 2 1/2 years of President Barack Obama's administration, the U.S. has deported a million people, almost all them Mexican, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Most repatriated Mexicans find a way to return to their homes. But others like Perez wind up staying, disoriented, without money or contacts. Many left Mexico as children or adolescents and don't have social security numbers or a voter registration card, the document Mexicans use as their general identification, much like driver's licenses in the U.S.

Getting copies of their birth certificates can be complicated and expensive.

Some are drug addicts who rob their fellow camp members.

Arturo Macias, 41, says he has lived in the river bed with about 50 people the last 2 1/2 years. The camp has the stench of decaying food that no one seems to notice and is littered with used syringes.

"Here on the border we hustle every day to see who can give us something to eat and (money) for drugs. Why am I going to lie?" said Macias, who is addicted to heroin. "I'm tired of this life, but the main thing is to get up in the morning with the gang and see how you are going to get something to buy food or drugs."

An accord signed by U.S. and Mexican authorities covering deportations from the San Diego area in 2008 guarantees a "safe, dignified and orderly" arrangement for deportees that safeguards human rights. It pledges not to separate families, to ensure deportations occur between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. for children, women and the elderly. Convicted criminals from three border-area California prisons should be sent back only on weekdays, when government offices are open and authorities can be notified.

But Vicki Gaubeca, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Regional Center for Border Rights, said the agreement is often violated and it provides no protection to keep a deportee from being left alone in an unfamiliar region without papers, money, friends or relatives.

"We are aware, for example, of repatriations of women at midnight (along the border) ... There is also a committee that is supposed to meet to oversee these agreements, but to date we do not know a single member," she said.

ICE in San Diego follows that agreement, said Robert Culley, director of deportations and removals in San Diego.

But other offices in Los Angeles, Seattle or San Francisco could be deporting outside those hours, Culley said. Each region has its own arrangement.

Mexico's National Institute of Migration has run a program for three years whose objective is to pay the full costs for repatriated migrants to return to their hometowns and work with their home state to find them employment.

But that program is not adequately funded and requires a birth certificate or ID card to participate, said the labor department representative in Baja California, Monica Garcia. Most deportees arrive with only a deportation notice.

Just 397 migrants participated in the program in the first half of 2011.

Agustin Banos lives with his wife in a shack by the canal, far closer to the Los Angeles textile factory where he worked as a tailor for two years than to his hometown of Acapulco, the Pacific resort whose poor neighborhoods are often bloodied by drug violence.

The couple takes turns looking out for police in the afternoons and night. In the mornings he heads to a local market to clean vegetables and wash cars, but it's not enough to afford the seven pesos (59 U.S. cents) to use a pay toilet down the street.

"We're going to try to cross again, maybe tomorrow or the day after," he said. "We're going alone, that's our only choice. Sometimes one wants to finish what he's started."

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TIJUANA, Mexico (AP) — After 15 years of installing marble in homes in Escondido, California, Porfirio Perez was caught without a driver's license during a February traffic stop and deported.

Boohhooo. Cry me a ****ing river! 15 years here in the states stealing jobs from American citizens and 42 years old and this crimigrant still isn't in the system?!? no pity for this fool.

Yeah, I bet he'd be stupid or crazy enough to cross over again - in the heat of the summer in August. Maybe WaterStationPrez might rescue him with one of his water towers...

Yep, they are victims - and it is the fault of the US. They did nothing wrong, after all, since they don't have driver licenses yet drive anyway, obtain work with false ID's and stole into our country without permission, but they are entitled because, well, exactly why?

Sure, the US taxpayers and citizens need to keep the crazy, drug addict and lawbreaking illegals because, well, exactly why?

Why are these idiots allowed to even publish this garbage?

Perez doesn't have the Mexican documents he would need to get a job, or the permanent addresses to get the documents.

"I'm looking for work here but I can't get any because I don't have papers or a voter ID," Perez said. "It's a real awful change, you know. There, when I was hungry I'd go to a restaurant. Here, you eat if you can get it. You walk back and forth, looking out for the police."

Does La Raza and MALDEF know about this? I'm sure they'd be protesting and making demands of the Mexican government if they did.

Mexican consulates are roving our nation to give documents to their people but when their people go home without them it's TS! That's funny in a sick sort of way.

Most repatriated Mexicans find a way to return to their homes. But others like Perez wind up staying, disoriented, without money or contacts. Many left Mexico as children or adolescents and don't have social security numbers or a voter registration card, the document Mexicans use as their general identification, much like driver's licenses in the U.S.

I'm sure he can get a matricula card and it'll be fixed right up! Maybe call laraza or maldef to demand mexico give in to their demands? Yeah that's it.

Oh, wait! What's that you say? Mexico doesn't accept the matricula cards?? Whyever not? Whereever there's a mexican, there's mexico, no? Well there are mexicans in mexico who need help, so get right on it. Laraza and maldef have no influence in mexico? Gee I wonder why?

Originally Posted by miguelina

Most repatriated Mexicans find a way to return to their homes. But others like Perez wind up staying, disoriented, without money or contacts. Many left Mexico as children or adolescents and don't have social security numbers or a voter registration card, the document Mexicans use as their general identification, much like driver's licenses in the U.S.

I'm sure he can get a matricula card and it'll be fixed right up! Maybe call laraza or maldef to demand mexico give in to their demands? Yeah that's it.

Oh, wait! What's that you say? Mexico doesn't accept the matricula cards?? Whyever not? Whereever there's a mexican, there's mexico, no? Well there are mexicans in mexico who need help, so get right on it. Laraza and maldef have no influence in mexico? Gee I wonder why?

Cant stop laughing! . miguelina, you are something else.

Originally Posted by Ratbstard

Perez doesn't have the Mexican documents he would need to get a job, or the permanent addresses to get the documents.

"I'm looking for work here but I can't get any because I don't have papers or a voter ID," Perez said. "It's a real awful change, you know. There, when I was hungry I'd go to a restaurant. Here, you eat if you can get it. You walk back and forth, looking out for the police."

Does La Raza and MALDEF know about this? I'm sure they'd be protesting and making demands of the Mexican government if they did.

Mexican consulates are roving our nation to give documents to their people but when their people go home without them it's TS! That's funny in a sick sort of way.

Ironic isn't it RB! Just goes to show Mexico only cares about assisting its citizens in this country who are participants in their invasion against this country. Once they go home, they could care less about them! One day this government will wake up and realize mexico for the danger they are to our country and do something about it.

I won't hold my breath however it will be anytime soon.

Originally Posted by Ratbstard

Perez doesn't have the Mexican documents he would need to get a job, or the permanent addresses to get the documents.

"I'm looking for work here but I can't get any because I don't have papers or a voter ID," Perez said. "It's a real awful change, you know. There, when I was hungry I'd go to a restaurant. Here, you eat if you can get it. You walk back and forth, looking out for the police."

Does La Raza and MALDEF know about this? I'm sure they'd be protesting and making demands of the Mexican government if they did.

Mexican consulates are roving our nation to give documents to their people but when their people go home without them it's TS! That's funny in a sick sort of way.

First he complains about being deported because he doesn't have documents, then he complains because he can't work in Mexico because he doesn't have documents. Does anyone else find the humor in this situation?

Sounds like mexico doesn't do for its own people what they expect the US to do for them! To bad the groups that support this invasion don't seem to care about mexicans south of the border. They only want to protect the ones stealing jobs here. Let face it most mexicans don't care about eachother unless they live under the threat of being deported that seems to be the only common bond most have so they unite against that. You don't see marching in the US over 40k deaths in mexico just about deportations. That's it