The Fight for Dignity

by Estefanía Castañeda Perez

In 2018, I have been exposed to stories of human suffering that have re-opened old wounds of my interactions with U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) that I experienced throughout my childhood. I have been crossing the border from Tijuana since middle school after I began attending school in San Diego. Despite being a U.S. citizen, I was often intimidated by CBP officers’ interrogation about my racial identity and purpose for crossing, making me question my own sense of belonging to U.S. society.¹ Scholars have documented that CBP officers make the decision to allow or deny entry based on their own notion of who is a “trustworthy” of “untrustworthy” entrant based of physical and behavioral attributes.² During the recent years, CBP has used its discretion to illegally turn away refugees at U.S. land ports of entry, where “The Trap” effectively pushes migrants and refugees to enter through unsafe and more lethal routes.³ Through these discretionary border policing practices, U.S. land ports of entry have become the epicenter of human suffering.

After the, Central American Caravan of refugees arrived from a grueling 2000-mile trek from their countries of origin to Tijuana,⁴ I began visiting them at Tijuana shelters to learn about their stories and their needs. At one shelter, I met a Mexican woman from Guerrero who had fled gang-related violence after her family members had been killed one-by-one over the course of a few months. She had been illegally denied entry by CBP officers when attempting to make an asylum claim at the San Ysidro Port of Entry. She instead was asked to get on a “list” and wait for her turn to seek asylum. Meanwhile, she was stuck in limbo in Tijuana. She later informed me that if she did not pass the credible fear interview, she would return to Guerrero because she did not want to start from scratch in Tijuana. That’s when I realized that for many refugees, a denial of asylum represents a death sentence. Another Central American refugee informed me that it was not his first time crossing the border. He had once been detained, and during his six months at the detention center, he was given hot water with salt and spoiled food on a regular basis. He also complained about the cold temperature in the detention center and informed me that an officer had told him that that it would “keep the detention center clean from the germs he brought from Central America.” After spending about two hours with them, I felt impotent because at the time, I could only listen to them. As a transborder Ph.D. student and being part of this community, I recognized my responsibility to use my academic training to help amplify their voices, which have been silenced for decades, and to stand alongside my migrant brothers and sisters in their fight for human rights.

Throughout this summer of 2018, I have learned about the power of solidarity and unity from Central American caravaneras/os in Tijuana who were not able to make it across the border, and are courageously organizing to demand respect for their rights in Mexico through grassroots organizations, many which are included in the Torn Apart/Separados list of allies, now available through a map. They are a beautiful family of social justice warriors that are not only fighting for themselves, but also for the rights of all sectors of society in Mexico, including for future refugees. Many have been stripped away from their humanity not only by CBP, but by the stories from the media that portray them as victims rather than the workers, artists, students, carpenters, aspiring pianists, who are simply trying to seek their international right for safety and refuge.

Although many of the caravan members have stayed in Tijuana or remain in transition, there are still many Central American caravaneras/os and other migrants in the detention centers who are suffering from irreversible damage, many who have been separated from their children. Reports of systematic abuse in the detention centers have left many appalled by the cruelty behind the Trump Administration’s “zero tolerance” policy. However, few recognize that the horrors of current immigration policies are a culmination of past administrations that have only further criminalized and dehumanized migrants through their policies, such as Operation Streamline; further continued to fortify walls, even when migrants are forced to cross through more lethal routes; and have further increased the budget of immigration enforcement agencies exponentially. A glimpse of those who are profiting from these immigration policies can be observed through the Torn Apart/Separados Vol. 2, “Districts” visualization.

Torn Apart/Separados Vol. 2 demonstrates the financial networks between academic institutions, services that sustain the ICE deportation machine, and the various sectors of society profiting from the carceral state. According “Textures” in Torn Apart/Separados Vol. 2, in 2018 alone, the U.S. government paid private prison companies like Geo Group, MVM, and CoreCivic more than $709 million USD. This number does not include the companies that have signed contracts with ICE to provide services like toiletries and food for detained migrants.

While visualizations of the extensive financial network backing ICE operations should cause grave concern, the team also provides evidence of participation of people of color in ICE contracts in “Gain.” In Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire warns about the danger among the marginalized who, instead of fighting for liberation for all, find liberation in becoming oppressors of their own people.⁵ One does not need to look beyond the racial make-up of the immigration enforcement agencies as an example of oppression led by people of color. One in three CBP employees are of Latino origin and in Southern California alone, 40% of ICE agents are Latino. One detained migrant with whom I recently spoke informed me that every time a Latino guard opens her cell, the female guard usually yells at her in Spanish “nobody wants you here, you are a criminal.” Imagine the traumatic implications of being reminded by a co-ethnic female who speaks your same language that you are sub-human and it is your fault that you are experiencing abuse. Therefore, the new visualizations of Torn Apart/Separados provide data that should make readers question not only the financial links that maintain ICE operations alive, but also the role of people of color whose communities are directly affected by human rights violations and arbitrary conditions at detention centers.

While projects like Torn Apart/Separados are essential to providing a visualization of the campaign of immigrant criminalization, the question that will continue to remain unanswered is why did it take until the current administration came into power for American society to finally react to the horrors of border and immigration enforcement. Our silence and inaction has turned immigrants and refugees who have either perished in the desert, or those that continue to remain in detention purgatory, a mere statistic. As researchers, scholars, activists, and citizens of the world, we all have a responsibility to use our capabilities to stand in solidarity and support immigrants’ fight for justice and dignity. There are endless forms and opportunities to get involved including committing oneself to regularly writing to detained migrants, volunteering for organizations working on the ground, or participating in actions. Their fight is my fight and as someone who has the legal status to cross the U.S.-Mexico border, it is a privilege to stand with refugees to fight por una vida digna y sin fronteras.

Estefanía Castañeda Pérez is a Ph.D. Student, UCLA Department of Political Science and Ford Foundation and National Science Foundation Predoctoral Fellow; Co-President, Binational External Affairs Coordinator for @TASO.