After having been kidnapped in MX and nearly drowning en route to Texas, a Salvadoran family fleeing death threats asked for U.S. asylum last week. Instead of protecting them, U.S. officers detained them in a freezing cold room for days where the kids got sick @humanrights1st 1/4
US immigration officers "threw out everything we'd brought right in front of our eyes. Jewelry, photos, our food, medications for the children. My daughter has asthma. They threw away her inhaler.” 2/4
Leading the exhausted, traumatized family to believe they were going to their U.S. relatives, officers put them on a plane for 3.5 hours then expelled them to Tijuana with nothing but the clothes they were wearing. "We saw the Mexican flag and begged them not to send us back"3/4
@POTUS seeking asylum is a human right. Stop torturing refugees. End Title 42 expulsions and #WelcomeWithDignity
22 families I met in Tijuana were expelled under T42 in the same cruel way from Texas in recent weeks and there at many more. ALL recounted painfully cold holding cells; DHS lying and throwing out their stuff. Most w/ sick kids. @POTUS is this refugee protection? @humanrights1st
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In a Tijuana shelter, I spoke with five Central American asylum-seeking mothers who U.S. immigration officers had expelled to Mexico under Title 42 with their young children within the past two weeks. Their stories are heartbreaking. @humanrights1st 1/6
All had crossed from Reynosa into Texas. All had been transferred by bus and plane to Tijuana after spending several days in freezing cold holding cells. Some tried to ask for asylum. “We were getting death threats in Guatemala. We tried to tell them but they wouldn’t listen.”2/6
None knew they were being expelled to Mexico until they were dumped at the Otay Mesa port of entry. Some reported that U.S. officers outright lied to them and said they were bringing them to their U.S. family members. “When I realized I was in Mexico, I just cried and cried.” 3/6
Today I accompanied our partners @HaitianBridge to a Tijuana shelter housing Haitian asylum seekers. One of them fled Haiti after an opposing political party tried to kill him. @humanrights1st 1/7
Because of Title 42 border closures, he’s now been waiting over a year in Tijuana to request U.S. asylum. He’s been robbed at gunpoint twice, and he lost factory job after his visa expired this week. “I don’t know what’s going to happen to me.” 2/7
Another Haitian man had made the treacherous journey to the U.S. with his wife and 3-year-old son in October after the family was threatened for their political beliefs. They were robbed of their documents and belongings along the way. 3/7