By Brandon Cottrell
Impunity Watch Reporter, North America  

MEXICO CITY, Mexico – As drug violence continues to plague much of western Mexico, there has been an increase in the number of Mexicans seeking asylum.  The United States, however, has been releasing women and children from detention centers before a formal ruling by an immigration judge is reached and many are ultimately deported.

For example, through the month of September forty-four women and children were released just from a detention center in San Diego.  After release, the asylum seekers are free to live in America while their asylum claims are pending.  Most of those claims, however, are rejected but some of the seekers remain in the U.S. as illegal immigrants or are deported.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte is critical of the releases and he also thinks the claims of asylum seekers are “being exploited . . . in order [for illegal immigrants] to enter and remain in the United States.”  While the Department of Homeland Security has not commented on the releases, it did issue a statement that said, “custody decisions are made on factors including ties to the community, flight risk and criminal record.”

Of those women and children who were released, is Elizabeth Silva.  Silva, who is from Hot Country, (‘Tierra Caliente”) which is outside of Mexico City, fled to the U.S. after her father and younger brother were shot and killed inside their own home.  Many of the others who seek asylum have similar stories of violence and many are from Hot Country.

Hot Country “is so completely ruled by one vicious drug cartel” that the residents formed self-defense gangs, hoping they could drive out the cartel.  That effort has failed and those involved in the self-defense groups have been targeted by the cartel.  Now, these “targets” are seeking asylum before they are killed.

Some of these asylum seekers carry letters from town official Ramon Contreras that says the holder of the letter is a victim of persecution and they “are under a death threat from a drug cartel . . . please provide them the protection they request.”  However, the letters are not much help, as the U.S. generally does not recognize organized crime as a reason to grant asylum.

There are similar problems at port of entries in Texas.  There, a group of immigrants, called the “Dreamers”, have spent time in the U.S. previously and consider it home.  But they are not being allowed back in.  Most of them are seeking political asylum, however, because they claim if they are forced to stay in Mexico they will be “instant targets” for having spent time in the U.S.

Asylum requests from Mexico have quadrupled since 2006, even though the Mexican government has launched an offensive against the drug cartels.  The U.S. Department of Homeland Security estimates that eleven Mexicans seek asylum daily at the San Diego border crossing, with most of them claiming to be victims of the drug cartels.  However, over 90% of the asylum requests are denied and some estimate that only 2% of requests are granted.  Additionally, many asylum seekers are turned away at the border and one such seeker said U.S. authorities “laughed at us” when we told them we wanted asylum.

For more information, please see:

ABC News – Mexicans Seek Asylum as Drug Violence Persists – 3 October 2013

Huffington Post – Big Win For Immigrant Activists Who Staged Border-Crossing Protest In Laredo – 1 October 2013

NPR – Asylum Application Surge And The Shutdown – 3 October 2013

The New Yorker – Dreamers At The Border – 3 October 2013