September 22, 2023 • 49 mins
James sits down with @borderkindness and @Pedroconsafos of @AFSCSanDiego to discuss their mutual aid response to the ongoing open air detention of asylum seeking refugees, and how listeners can help.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey everyone, it's me James, and just before you hear
the episode, i'd want to warn you that you can
hear our telephones going absolutely mental for much of this episode.
That's because as we were recording, people have found out
that SDG and E San Diego Gas Electric were restricting
access to one of the sites where migrants were.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
In need of aid.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
People were very concerned about that, so they were reaching
out to James and Jacqueline and Pedro to ask for
assistance and to me to let me know if I
could get the word out. That's why you can hear
our phones going crazy, and I think it's good that
it's in there in a sense because perhaps you can
get a sense of how mad the last few weeks
have been for everyone. Our phones have constantly be going off.
(00:45):
I'm sure mine a lot less than James and Jacquelines
and Pedros because people are overwhelmed and they need more
help than we were able to give. So consider that
background noise a blessing and I hope you enjoyed the episode.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Thanks.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Hi everyone, it's me James today and I hear again
to talk about the border today. I'm joined by some guests.
I'm joined by James and Jacqueline from Border Kindness, who
we've heard from before, and I'm also joined by Pedro
Rias from the American French Service Committee. If you guys
would like to introduce yourself and explain the kind of
role you play along the border, that'd be wonderful if
(01:21):
we start with Pedro, because folks haven't heard from him before,
that would be great.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
Great.
Speaker 4 (01:25):
Thank you James, and it's such an honor to be
on the show together with folks from Border Kindness, James
and Jacqueline. It's great to see you again. My name
is Pedro Rios. I'm director of the American Friend Service
Committee's US Mexico Border Program, which is a Quaker based
human rights organization. I've been on staff now for twenty
years working in San Diego on border issues and it's
(01:49):
been a whorldwind of two decades of work being able
to follow this topic. Our work primarily focuses on border
issues and we have four components, one of which is
documenting civil and human rights abuses that occur when contact
goes awry between primary federal immigration authorities with members of
(02:14):
civil society, including migrants and order community residents. Documentation could
be case evolving abuse of practices, abuse of policies, cases
evolving abuse of authority, and so on and so forth.
We also do a lot of policy analysis and advocacy
(02:35):
at the local level, at the state level, and at
the federal level, trying to hold agencies accountable, making them
more transparent, ensuring that there are oversight mechanisms and how
they operate. And that's done in conjunction with several coalitions
at the county wide level in San Diego, but also
(02:58):
at the national level with the Southern Border Communities Coalition
and other organizations as well. And then we obviously work
in allyship with a lot of other organizations that have
campaigns of mutual interest, some of which have been going
on for a long time, such as the Friends of
Friendship Park and trying to gain access public access to
(03:22):
Friendship Park, which currently is being impacted by the construction
of two thirty foot border walls. And we also work
directly with community members and providing information about what the
rights are, how they can become and our leaders in
their own communities, and how they can be active in
(03:43):
straightening their communities and providing guidance to other people who
might be in the same circumstances. So in a nutshell,
that's the work that we do.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
Yeah, great, it's very important work.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
And then James and Jacqueline, do you want to explain
Folks are familiar I think with border kindness from the
pre this episode, but like, maybe what have you been
doing in the last I can't remember two weeks like
since people started being held out in the open again.
Speaker 5 (04:11):
So in our organizations kind of always evolving with like
the evolving needs of the border, and over the last
I want to say, like years in particular, we've really
started to emphasize our services being present in the rural border.
We're based in Mahikali, primarily, our water drops are generally
(04:31):
in the Imperial Valley region, and we started to extend
our services to the rural community in San Diego County
with regards to like day labor, providing aid to micro
community that's living in rural communities. So all that to say,
when the border appeared to be having one of its
(04:52):
episodes of chaos, what's happened in the last couple of
weeks with folk being detained between the walls down in
sanny Siedrol and then folks being you know, just dumped
out into the street at the transit centers if we've
been seeing all over Sandygo County. We sort of held
(05:14):
off because we knew this was going to happen in Hakuma.
This is kind of one of those sixth sense kind
of things, like when you see the writing on the
wall and it was like only a matter of time
before people ended up pushed into rural San Diego County,
and unfortunately that has been the case. So we were
actually out in the desert doing a water drop and
(05:37):
heard that that impact had occurred and there were hundreds
of people in Hakkumba. So we've been out there providing
aid ever since.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Yeah, so perhaps we could describe these. So there are
like three things I think people would benefit from knowing about.
One is the detention of people between the walls in
sanny Cedral, which I think Pedro has seen a lot
of I've seen and we've seen each other down there
several days. The detention of folks in the open desert
in Hakumba, and this this dumping of migrant to various
(06:08):
transit centers across the county. Those are the three things
a week we've seen, like in massive numbers.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
This last couple of.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Weeks, so preps, we could start with explaining her Cumba
and then Pedro can take on explaining the other two
because I know he's been responding to those. So can
you just tell us, like what you saw, the number
of people, the conditions in which they're being held, and
that kind of stuff.
Speaker 6 (06:32):
Yeah. Usually, well we're seeing now. I mean now it's
currently what today? What isday?
Speaker 2 (06:40):
Wednesday? So I know it is.
Speaker 6 (06:43):
Yeah, yeah, well this morning I asked Jacke on what
day it was, because it just seems like a broken blur,
you know, the day out. But we are on Wednesday night.
That's Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. Every day so far we
have noticed a revolving door of roughly two and fifty
(07:09):
spread out between one to three camps every day. There's
a camp on the east side in Hokomba, There's a
camp that's on the west side of Hokkumba, and then
there's a camp that's just outside Hokomba and Boulevard that
seems to be the biggest camp right now. That camp
is the largest one because it's kind of hidden. You
(07:33):
got to drive down from the main highway. You have
to drive, you know, at least fifteen minutes you know,
down some dirt roads, back roads, you know, past ranches
and stuff like that to get to that open air camp,
where the other ones, especially like we saw in May,
were more like wide open, closer to the towns, closer
(07:55):
to visibility, closer to highway access. And so what we've
noticed is that that speaking with the locals and seeing
for ourselves that every day the camps that are more
visible are having less people coming in and they're being
taken out faster. And so that part, I think is,
(08:17):
you know, could be done for a multitude of reasons.
But the camp that's hidden and out of you is
the one that seems kind of strategic and seems calculated
on a greater level that as people are being loaded
up on vans or buses to be taken out for processing,
almost the same amount of people gets walked in to
(08:40):
that camp from the actual border by border patrol. So
it it's definitely an odd situation that's going on there.
It seems definitely calculated orchestrated and something that you know,
we feel that will be going on for quite a while.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Yeah, let's let me talk about that, right, Like people
are crossing and then being being transported, like you say,
on foot by Border Patrol to the camp. That's your understanding,
right to that camp in in near Boulevard.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
I'll say, I don't want to give the exact.
Speaker 6 (09:11):
Location, correct, Yes, So we witnessed that as well. We
witnessed on Monday night that we were there to help
distribute food and warm supplies, and I think a total
of five or six Border Patrol vans had, you know,
about one hundred people or so lined up and loaded
(09:34):
up onto those vans. And then right as they were
getting ready to have the last two vans leave, we
saw in the distance, in the opposite direction, Order Patrol
their truck driving behind a group of roughly eighty eighty
five new migrants coming in on foot. Yeah, right around
(09:56):
there's a gap in the fence.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Yeah, I saw people walking in. I was there the
day before you guys, So I was early as I
was the early Monday morning, and I saw the same thing,
like you know, sort of just after dawn. I couldn't
make out who was walking home just because it was dark.
Can you explain briefly, and then then we'll move to
to Pedro's situation. Can you explain the services that are
provided for them by Border Patrol, and then what is
(10:21):
provided for them by volunteers.
Speaker 5 (10:24):
By Border Patrol. It's essentially nothing. When this occurred in May,
we heard that most people were receiving an eight ounce
bottle of water daily, not really distributed in an organized manner. Currently,
we're observing that people are when they arrive, they're at
times provided with a sixteen ounce bottle of water and
(10:46):
potentially a little proddler sized pack of goldfish crackers. Border
Patrol is not providing any other continued services food, shelter, sanitation,
anything like that. Those things have all been organized at
a community level by a variety of organizations such as
(11:07):
ours that's comprised of just regular people. So it's the
government's task of managing a humanitarian crisis.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
They have.
Speaker 5 (11:22):
Like really outsourced it to the general community of supporters.
So they have taken not just the role of not
having any responsibility towards caring for migrants in like the
most basic manner, but it also seems like they have
come to expect the general community to come in and
(11:44):
fill the gaps that they're not meeting. So Border Patrol
is not providing them with anything. It's everyday regular people
that are showing up with blankets, food, water, hygiene items.
It's getting really cold, so people are distributing warm clothing, diapers, formula,
anything that people need is being provided by the community.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
Yeah, that's a good summary, I think. So, Pedrick, could
you explain how the how the situation is in sanny
Edra and then also at the transit centers and it's
a pretty similar situation, I think.
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Yeah, sure, I'll start with Sunny zero and the location
where community members and organizations have set up is known
as Whiskey eight. There are at least three other locations
that we know where encampments have formed. One is Whisky four,
which is close to the Las America Shopping Mall. It's
an outlet mall closer to the port of entry, and
(12:39):
then about a mile west of Whiskey eight there's Spooners Mesa,
and then close to that there's ninety one X. The
Spooners Mesa is primarily where the men's encampment is has
been arranged, and this happened back in May. There is
an incident where Border patrol decided to to move all
(13:01):
the single adult men and walk them marched them essentially
about a mile up a hill and then up another
hill to get to Spooner's Mesa. After some advocacy last week,
we convinced super Patrol to allow two of us to
go up there to feed about anywhere between three hundred
(13:21):
and eighty and four hundred men. And it took us
over an hour, about an hour fifteen minutes to feed
all of the men. Fortunately, we just barely had enough
food for all of them. This was in the evening
and as we were driving in and driving out, all
we could see was milar blankets strown about, and that's
(13:43):
all that was up there. And these were the men
that were these milar blankets down in Whiskey eight. How
community members and organizations have arranged the solidarity support stations
have been in four set So you have the charging state,
you have the medical supplies and other item station, then
(14:04):
you have the food station and then the water station.
And so we try to maintain the medical supplies. The
food station is available only when we have enough food
to provide substance to everyone there. We don't want to
create a situation where we only serve half of the
people or a quarter of the people. And then the
other people go hungry, and mind you, it's important to
(14:25):
point out that when people arrive there, they are hungry,
they are thirsty. Some of them have scrapes because they
scale the primary border barrier and injure themselves. Others are
wet because they walked through the canal to get to
that location. I've also witnessed on several locations where a
border patrol will tell people who are injured to walk
(14:48):
towards our location because they tell them that that's where
we will provide them with medical care. Now, I think
it's important to mention that under customers in a border
protection which is a parent agency of the Border Patrol,
under their national standards for how they are supposed to transport, escort,
(15:08):
detain and search people under their custody, they are obligated
to feed, to provide water, to provide shelter, to treat
medical urgencies. Anytime that individuals are under their custody. There
is some back and forth. Orbitral locally will say that
individuals are not under their custody until they are being transported,
(15:32):
even though they will provide them with a wristband or
bracelet in some cases tell them to remove their shoelaces,
direct them to where they should be walking, yell at
them when they're not forming in lines in order to
be picked up, sometimes throw a fit and will not
pick people up even though they're supposed to be there
(15:53):
to do that because people are not in lines as
quickly as it should be. All of this to several
of our organizations in the cake that border patrol at
some to some degree has people under their custody and
as such is violating the these national standards because it's
(16:14):
not meeting their needs at any level. Besides maybe the
bottle of water might provide and the one or two
granola bars they provide per day.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
If even that, Yeah, I think it's the national border patrol.
Pio also claimed to me that they were not detaining
people and that people were free to quote return to Mexico,
which like these people, I'm from Mexico and in many
cases and like I think the first day, maybe I
saw you speaking to one family who come from Mexico,
(16:46):
but the vast guority of people weren't, and there'd also
be entering Mexico between ports of entry because they're in
the United States at this time. So yeah, it's just
not that those people are like, there's there's lots of
evidence that they're being detained, even if they say they're not.
(17:12):
What then happens to those people? We've all seen it, right.
These vans pull up. They generally process people in a
certain order, which is to take unaccomplited miners and women
who are alone with children, and then families and then
single adults. What happens to them once they get on
that van? Do we have a clear sense of that
(17:34):
where they end up.
Speaker 4 (17:35):
They will be taken to any one of several borbaitral
stations for processing. And it's that processing stage where most
of them who are in these locations are there because
they want to present themselves to the authority and begin
an asilum claim, and so it's how they answer the
(17:56):
questions while being processed that they get tracked, mostly for asylum.
There are some that will be quickly removed from the
country expeditiously, but most of them will be tracked for asylum.
They will be given a court date when they should
show up, and that court date the court location depends
(18:17):
on where their final destination will be. Technically, Mexicans can
only be detained for forty eight hours non Mexicans can
only be detained no more than seventy two hours, So
within that detention period, they then are being transported to
one of four locations in San Diego County, two of
which are in San Diego, the Santy Zero Transit Center,
(18:40):
in the IRIS Transit Center, one in Oceanside, and the
other in Alcohol. And so we're seeing the majority of
the people being transported to saniny Ero and to IRIS,
and that's where colleagues with other sister organizations are leading
the charge to try to support them with seeing in
charging phones, providing food, clothing, getting them to the airport,
(19:04):
getting them transportation, getting them housing, and as much as
limited as that's possible, trying to connect them with lost
family members. Because families have been separated, there are adult
children eighteen nineteen who also are trying to figure out
where their family members are. And in some cases, as
a conversation I had with them men from Venezuela, he
(19:24):
had no idea what city he was at either though
he was in San Diego, and so trying to make
that type of arrangement and clarification is always challenging as well.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Yeah, and obviously also expensive, right, Like these things all
place burdens on like your donation network, and both in
sort of the community in general. And perhaps we can
talk about like, because the scale of support that's been
provided by the community is extremely impressive, and given how
many people have already come through this sort of not
(19:57):
detention detention system, perhaps both you could talk about like
the support you've been able to provide and how people
who are not in San Diego can help you continue
to provide that support.
Speaker 5 (20:12):
So the first day that we heard of folks coming in,
because obviously it's interesting because border patrol, like Pedro says
like they're claiming that these people are not under their care,
but they're very much acting as if they're under their
detained care. They're telling people that if they call an
(20:34):
ambulance to seek medical care, as we observe, they say, well,
that's going to affect your case if you leave. And
so people are very much under the deliberate impression that
they are being detained, but they're not being cared for
in the most basic way. And so we first responded
on Saturday. By Sunday we were there with five hundred
(20:55):
meals that went very very quickly, providing shelter items for
people so tarps. Hakumba is a very rugged desert terrain.
There is no shade in these areas, so people are
making sort of like makeshift shelters, but there is nothing
(21:15):
shielding them from the sun, which is really unrelenting all
day and it gets up to the nineties. So we've
been providing tarps, pop ups, that sort of thing, so
people are not becoming sick from overexposure. We're providing hygiene items,
we're providing just basic needs. And that gets incredibly expensive
(21:38):
because if it was a static situation, such as in
May when there was eighteen hundred to two thousand people,
that was a huge undertaking that also took a lot
of community collaboration to meet the needs of so many people.
But this time around, as James says, it's like a
revolving door of hundreds and hundreds of people. So it's
taking hundreds and hundreds While at any given time there
(22:02):
may be only and I say only two to three
hundred people, that doesn't mean that to only two to
three hundred people needed to be fed that day. It's
that you know that is who is there at that time,
and when people arrive, as Pedro said, like they haven't
eaten in days. We talked to people that said that
they took two days to walk to Hakumba. So if
(22:24):
they arrived to Tijuana without much food in their belly
and then they're having to walk for two days, they're
arriving starving and begging for food and not being provided
with absolutely anything. So if it wasn't for all of
the organizations that are showing up and taking sort of
shifts to feed people, there would be nothing for them.
(22:46):
And we have absolutely no idea how long this is
going to go on. It could be over today, it
could go on for months year. I mean, we really
don't know what to expect. And organizations are being relied
on to provide you know, life sustaining care for people,
but we're not being communicated with from border patrol as
(23:10):
to basically anything, what the outlook is, what the numbers are,
what the updates of how the situation is going to evolve.
So every day is a surprise and we need to
have resources to be able to meet the needs of
that day. It's incredibly like consuming of every resource including
time and gas is six dollars a gallon.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
Yeah, now you need to drive your truck right because
like you can't get to some of the locations, Like
I know, I have a bigger truck and looks of
my friends about to catch a rye with me because
the cause can't make it.
Speaker 5 (23:44):
The exactly like, we have people that have gas efficient
low priuses and stuff, and they're going to bottom out
out there. So we have our huge lifted jeep that
you know doesn't get as much gas mileage as something,
but it's also going to be able to get the
supplies out there. So every aspect of it is incredibly
consuming of resources and we don't know what to expect.
(24:09):
It's not it's hard to budget. You don't know what
I expect. So the community has obviously come together in support.
But then it's like, well, how do we manage this
when we don't we can't forecast what's going on, So
it's tough. It's definitely tough. We need sustained support.
Speaker 6 (24:31):
If I may add on that, as Jacquelin said, the
people are showing up hungry, heavening for days. You know,
we get reports that you know, people are showing up
just begging for food, and the federal government more specifically DHS,
more specifically CBP Border Patrol know this there's trying to
(24:54):
stall people out at whatever the endgame is, and maybe
it's just another arm of you know, prevention through the
two parents. It's cruel. It's on purpose. People you know
are are the ponds and whatever, you know, game is
being played and it's cruel and that's you know, we're
(25:14):
doing what we can to try to offset that as
much as possible, but cruelty is definitely.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
They're all across the border.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Just to kind of upbuild on what James said, like,
I think it's very easy for this construct of migrants
to like always be like this sort of demonized other
Fox News and KUSI and all these outlets do that
very well. But I think it's really important to like
the people who were being cruel to, Like I saw
a lady breastfeeding in the desert on Sunday night. I've
(25:52):
seen grandparents, I've seen people who are eight months pregnant,
little children like these aren't like people who have done
anything wrong, and they just for whatever reason they're coming
here doesn't really matter. They don't deserve to be treated
like that. And like James said, it's something of an
induced Like I've been to natural disasters all over the world,
(26:15):
and reported on those and seen those, and I've been
to refuge camps all over the world, But like it's
some big of a unique to the US problem that
our federal government can click its fingers and induce a
humanitarian crisis and then like hold its hands up in
the air and say we can't help you like that,
Like aside from dictatorial regimes and places I've reported in,
(26:38):
like the people don't governments don't do that very often.
And like James said, it's these people who paid the price,
it's not us for the most part. Peder, could you
maybe explain a little bit of how American French Service
Committee has been able to respond and the resources you've used,
and how you can help make this a little bit
less painful for the people who are being held in
(27:01):
between defenses.
Speaker 4 (27:02):
Sure, learning from the experience that we had back in March,
April and May, we heard a few weeks ago that
there were people lined up in an area that we
could not see from the US side, but could be
seen from the Mexican side, just west of the Sandy
Sea Port of entry, with people wearing and using Milar blankets.
(27:23):
And so the Milar blankets were an indication to us
that people were there for probably longer than four hours,
and so we kept monitoring that, asking colleagues in Tikwana
to inform us if they had seen any other groups
like that, and off and on over the past month
there were reports of that and it wasn't until about
two weeks ago that someone said that they were there
(27:43):
for a long period of time. So last last week
we set up what we called an observation post at
Whiskey eight so that we could determine for ourselves how
long people were there, what sort of needs they might have,
and how to respond whether to set up the solidarity
support stations again and quickly we determined that that's what
(28:07):
we needed to do, so we call our colleagues from
other organizations when or to set up. Opula for instance,
has been extremely helpful and leading the charge in different places.
The Appreciate Collective so Mutual Group also has been extremely
important in having their people out there, and Friends and
Friendship Park also has been important. So all these organizations
(28:29):
that responded quickly and started to build from the experience
that we had back in late spring setting up these
stations to charge phones. Phones are lifeline for people and
back in may or Patrol threatened us and they said,
if you want to keep feeding people, you can't be
charging their phones. And so we said, well, we're going
(28:52):
to have to keep charging phones because people need them.
And fortunately Borbu backed off then and now it's part
of what we do right. We charge phones, and they's
how people are able to communicate with their loved ones,
especially if they've been separated. Feeding people is just as
much as we're able to even if it's just a sandwich,
even if it's a warm meal, that we're able to
(29:16):
get through the bars or the secondary border barrier. That
could mean the difference between someone staying healthy or someone
becoming seriously ill. Bandaging up small cuts could relieve someone
from getting an infection, identifying when medical emergencies pop up,
(29:38):
so an eighth month pregnant person who is suddenly having
labor pains and having a needing to call nine to
one one, for instance, or insisting with por patrol that
the one month old child cannot remain overnight in between
border walls, and just insisting and insisting and insisting insisting
(29:59):
that the to port parties that they have there need
to be serviced, for instance, And so all of this
advocacy is happening at the same time that our colleagues
and allies are also feeding people, and the constant communication
with different elected officials pushing on them to take charge
and to respond has been one of the different aspects
(30:24):
of our response to what is a humanitarian disaster that
has been slowly evolving, i would say, over years and years,
because human migration isn't centered around humanitarian needs and human rights.
It's been centered around enforcement, around militarization, around cruel deterrence,
(30:46):
as James was talking about, which creates conditions where people
are led to suffer. And that's what we're seeing right now,
people suffering because of how this has been manufactured, how
immigration has been dealt with, regardless of who's in the
White House, over and over and over, and so now
(31:06):
we're challenged to respond to these humanitar needs in ways
that are stretching our limits, but we're able to do
it and hopefully lifting up the dignity of people that
are placing under these terrible, inhumane conditions.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah, I think it's very important to give people a
little bit of dignity as much as we can. One
thing that you mentioned that we haven't spoken about we
should is elected officials and local federal state government. How
much support, if any, have either of these sites received
from people in elected office.
Speaker 4 (31:42):
You know, we have had support from Senator step Balia's office.
That's been to me impressive to see how much interest
there is, how much advocacy there is from staff from
that office. We have not necessar there we had much
support from congressional or federal senators. We have not seen
(32:06):
them really on the ground. There is a responsibility I
believe that the County of San Diego has to meet
some of these challenging circumstances at the transit centers. They're bocking,
I feel, and to the detriment of people who need
these services and need the support. I believe the San
(32:30):
Diego Police Department has been suggesting where people should be
dropped off and not listening to folks on the ground
about how the Irish station should be central and not
dividing the drop offs between Irish and saney Ceso, for instance.
So there's a lot of a lot of necessity for
(32:50):
local governments to be coordinating with state and federal governments,
and that's lacking, again to the detriment of people who
are cut in the middle.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
How about James and Jack And have you seen any
sort of government support.
Speaker 6 (33:05):
No, not at all. I've you know, heard through channels
of you know, sources that work for the county and
they claim that they're handcuffed or that it's Border Patrol's responsibility,
and then Border Patrol is saying it's the county's responsibility,
and it just it seems like appointing fingers. No one's
(33:30):
trying to take you know, responsibility for it. And maybe
that's because it's going to be something that's going to
go on for a while. It's not something that either
wants to you know, take on the responsibility of. And
you know you've seen county supervisors speak out against it,
pushing the blame. People are here, this is San Diego County,
(33:54):
this is the United States. Someone needs to take care of,
you know, the people here. That's that's the role of government.
That's why people pay taxes for you know, for services
and services need to be provided for. You know, we
pay taxes so other people can get services as well.
Citizens non citizens like that.
Speaker 4 (34:12):
To me, it seems so easy.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean that's.
Speaker 6 (34:18):
That's everything that you've been told. But everything that you're
not seeing, you know, in practice. So I mean, this
whole thing is to us on the ground. It seems
so simple of how it should be done. But like
you know, anytime, and we've spoken on it, I think
on the last episode as well, like money's big issues.
Going to spend all this money, they need to make
(34:39):
sure that their money is going in the right pockets
that they wanted to.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Yeah, Like I was sitting out in her cumber with
a colleague and we got overflown by a uh sixty
black Hawk, like a Border Patrol helicopter, and it just
hovered around checking us out, and like it's just so.
Speaker 2 (34:58):
I don't know, it's just.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
So depressing to see this helicopter which costs millions of dollars,
which are thousands of dollars just to take off next
to the border wall, which got twelve million dollars a mile.
And like on the same day that the San Diego
City Council filed an amicus brief in this case of
the Supreme Court to allow it to further criminalize and
house people. We have all these resources and we're just
throwing them. As Pedera said, enforcement and criminalization of the
(35:21):
most marginalized people in our communities rather than giving a
thirsty person bottle of water or like a little baby blanket.
And yeah, it's really hard.
Speaker 5 (35:33):
It's one of those agents over time of the day
could literally feed everybody there. Yes, we're all like, you know,
calculating calories per dollar of like the mule and trying
to get like every single dollar to stretch because we
don't know how long this is going to go on,
because we know that public perception and interest is something
(35:58):
that is not sustained. And purpose too, because for instance,
Border Patrol is claiming and they were on what outlet
was it.
Speaker 6 (36:08):
CBS CBS eight local San Diego said, I need to
report that the Kumba capture cleared. There's no one's there.
I just you know, I had to step away from
this this recording for a few update that there are
people still showing up. There's trying to get cleared out
as quick as possible as people show up because it's
(36:29):
in the public eye. But also now the power company
is threatening legal action and criminal action against any aid
orgs or people they show up.
Speaker 2 (36:40):
Oh great, cool, that'll be fun.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
Yeah, I mean, yeah, the reporting on this has been poor,
even more poor than it was in May. I'll say,
like out in Hookumbaya, it's hard to get to. James
and I both spent a decent junk of yesterday morning
trying to direct people how to not get lost out there.
But like I think, more pertinently, when there is not
an election or like a narrative that migration fits in,
(37:04):
it gets certainly by national outlets forgotten. With the end
of Title forty two in May, I think everyone had
their like sort of doomsday op eds in the weeks beforehand,
and then that that didn't actually happen in the way
that it had been sort of like quote unquote experts
who don't come to the border very often had predicted
(37:26):
it would, and so folks turned up, especially at Whiskey eight,
and did this sort of crisis story. But we haven't
seen that this time, and.
Speaker 5 (37:36):
You know, now it's appearing really different because, like you
see sort of the management by border patrol of the
situation in order to sort of shield the public from
like the true level of the crisis. So in claiming
(37:57):
that Boomba has been cleared, I suppose that's technically correct
if they're referring to the you know, they're relying on
reality in order to so people, the average everyday person
that's not immersed in this is going to read that
and be like, oh good, it's been cleared, because like,
my family back home knows a lot of like really
conservative folks outland Pear Valley, and like even the most
(38:17):
conservative people I knew back in May were like, oh
my gosh, how could they have babies out there in
the desert. That's so horrible. And people had, you know,
a lot of really strong emotions to seeing families huddled
in the desert for a week. Now it seems like
there's a really deliberate management of like the pr with
(38:39):
respect to this situation. So yeah, like relying on the
technicality of Hakumba being cleared because the main camp in
town has been cleared, but ten fifteen minutes away, there's
still hundreds of people, And we're the ones that are
out on social media screaming into the void into each other. Hey,
this is still happening, people, are you know, there's an
amputee out here whose leg is bleeding. There is someone
(39:02):
out here who hasn't had his heart medication for a week.
Like those kind of situations are occurring still, while the
report and the public reception is like, oh hahkum has
been cleared. It's all good. So unless somebody is like
already involved, they're generally not hearing about it. And I
think that's on purpose too.
Speaker 1 (39:19):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think it's Yeah, that's a very
that's a very niche technicality. It might not be within
the boundaries of the town of a cumber but like
people are still being corraled in the desert with no services, right,
and that that's what we should care about, not which
districts they're in or what have you. So I think
people have probably had why now that things are bad
(39:41):
and we don't know how bad they will be, and
then maybe they'll get worse, maybe they'll get better, and
hopefully they'll want to support. So how can people do that?
Like what resource? Like what I guess the concrete actions
can they take? Where can they give you money? How
can they send you supplies? If they want to volunteer
in there in the county, how can they do that?
And what kind of following is I'm nice needed?
Speaker 6 (40:01):
Yeah for border kindness. Monetary donations are the biggest help
that allows us to meet current needs, daily needs. We're
on venmo at border dash Kindness Cash app at border
Kindness Cash. They'll info at border Kindness dot org.
Speaker 5 (40:22):
Volunteering volunteering is pretty sensitive, We're not We understand that
our team is already incredibly taxed, so we do need
support in terms of like food preparation and getting supplies
out there, transporting supplies. But it is a very sensitive situation,
(40:46):
so we do want to I don't know if vet
or we want to be able to talk to the
people that want to volunteer. So certain expectations that they
may have accep certain needs that we may have are
all communicated really clearly. So the organization alo very amazingly
(41:10):
agreed to help us with that task of screening volunteers.
So people, if they are wanting to do so and
come out to Hakumba to email volunteer at alotro Lado
dot org.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
Perfect, Yeah, that's pretty good.
Speaker 5 (41:29):
Yeah, I'll I'll send you that info and they can
just say like what are they interested in doing, where're
located and that sort of thing, and then we'll be
in touch. Primarily, I mean more than anything, like twenty
dollars is a tarp to cover a family and keep
somebody shielded from the wind. We can feed a lot
(41:50):
of people with one hundred dollars. So financial support is
the most direct way. Even though it's not necessarily always
feasible for people, it is the most efficient way for
us to be able to buy items in bulk.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
Yeah, I think even five bucks, right, like, maybe that's
two people, and it really makes a day to have
a whole meal.
Speaker 4 (42:11):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 5 (42:12):
Yeah, anything helps.
Speaker 1 (42:14):
So yeah, people can definitely do this. How about for
American French service cannit be better? How can people donate
volunteer help?
Speaker 4 (42:21):
Yeah, I mean I would. I would also stress what
Jacqueline said in terms of vetting people and volunteers, it's
you know, it's not it's not easy work, and we
want to make sure that when people are volunteering that
there's a certain level of emotional strength that people are
able to have. It's very tough for work, and at
(42:42):
the same time make sure that what we're doing does
not negatively impact those that we are presuming to want
to help, right, And so that's important. I think going
through those channels, if you you know the folks that
are leading the the work at the transit centers, check
(43:03):
in with them, first, but then there are other things
that could be done. The other day, someone showed up
with twenty boxes of pizza, you know, a very useful
easy way to support connecting with people and finding out
what the needs are. That's another way. If if you
would rather purchase the tarps yourselves, for instance, do that
(43:24):
and then we can pick them up. We can find
out how to meet and pick pick up those items.
If you want to donate, there are multiple organizations doing
this work. I believe someone was working on a list
to produce for us. Going on the website a f
C dot org and being sure that you find our
(43:45):
locations San Diego, so that our program then receives that
donation directly. If the program goes to the overall a FHC,
we won't see it. So just be very mindful of
when you're donating to a f C AFC dot org.
First locate sending your program office and then find the
donate page on there so that we can be assured
(44:06):
that you are sending it to our program. Or you
can definitely contact me and I could also assist you
with that.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah, I think it's great. I think it's important that
both of you sort of centered with regard to volunteering,
that there are organizations that exist to serve volunteers through
facilitating like a service experience to them, and that that's
not what is happening here, Like this is about serving
people who are very vulnerable, so like there has to
be some kind of vetting process and people have to
(44:35):
understand that, like that's part of keeping those people safe
and that's why that's happening. So yeah, thank thank you
very much for this. We'll keep covering it obviously, and
I really hope people can find some resources to donate
because it's been very taxing financially and all these groups
and on our community generally. Is there anything else you
(44:58):
guys would like to share before we finish?
Speaker 2 (45:00):
Yep.
Speaker 4 (45:01):
The only thing I would add is that, you know,
pressing the authorities. That's the other way if you are
able to connect with the county, you know, your county
supervisor in San Diego, press on them that they have
a responsibility and an obligation to respond to this in
a way that supports people who need to support And
(45:23):
that's where I would I would push towards.
Speaker 1 (45:25):
Yeah, I'll add to that that having spoken to people
in the county and in state office, Like if you call,
that makes more difference. So and if you email, so
if you have the time to make a phone call,
that could help a lot. Anything else from you, James Jacqueline,
That's what.
Speaker 2 (45:41):
I can think of.
Speaker 6 (45:41):
I mean everything changes daily, so if we were to
record them so every single day, I'm sure I can
come with something new.
Speaker 2 (45:46):
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (45:47):
For people to stay clued in with channels of communications
such as this podcast that are actually with people on
the ground and share that with their community is really important.
Like we're already getting like some social media kind of comments.
I mean it happens every time about how we're aiding
and abetting people breaking the law, but it's the government
(46:08):
breaking the law. They're breaking international asylum law. And it's
really important for people who aren't as versed in all
of this to stay aware of that that everybody who
is presenting for asylum has a legal right to do so,
not that it matters, I mean they have, like it's
a humanitarian right, yes, But for people who are very
(46:30):
concerned with legality, or at least they lean heavily on legality,
presenting for asylum is illegally protected right. And that's something
that is actually being cut short by the government in
violation of that.
Speaker 1 (46:51):
Yeah, I think you're right. It doesn't really matter. Like
I already don't give a shit about.
Speaker 5 (46:54):
Like come back for people that really about it.
Speaker 3 (46:58):
You know.
Speaker 1 (46:59):
Yeah, it's good to it's good to remind them that
they are wrong, both morally and legally.
Speaker 4 (47:04):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (47:04):
Yeah, So what would your.
Speaker 1 (47:06):
Social media spa if people wanted to keep up to
date with what's happening?
Speaker 5 (47:10):
Border Kindness on Instagram tends to have the most up
to date common I mean shares of like what we're doing,
and that will have updates in our stories and our
posts of how to help what's going on.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
How about you, Pedro.
Speaker 4 (47:28):
We're we're terrible with our social media, but you can
definitely find some of our work there a f C
San Diego. Just look for a f C San Diego
minus Pedro Consos Pedro mostly on on Twitter, some ig
and I'll be updating some items later today.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
Perfect. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (47:51):
One more question, because people contacted me in May to
ask if they could donate amiles to facilitate travel for
folks after they've been paroled into the Is that something
that AFSC can do?
Speaker 4 (48:05):
There is another organization I'm not sure that's what you've
just mentioned now.
Speaker 3 (48:09):
The Miles for Migrants, Yeah, Miles for Yeah absolutely absolutely
a wonderful organization and that we've used through some of
our other assist or organizations and getting people to their
final destinations.
Speaker 4 (48:22):
I would say that might be the best way right now.
Speaker 1 (48:24):
Okay, Yeah, so that's the thing people can do if
they happen to have a setup plus of those. And great,
thank you so much for your time. I know you're
all extremely busy. I appreciate it. And yeah, hopefully people
listening will find a way to support if they can.
Speaker 4 (48:37):
Thanks guys, great, thank you.
Speaker 2 (48:44):
It could happen here as a production of cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
cool Zonemedia dot com or check us out on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 5 (48:56):
You can find sources for It could Happen here, updated
monthly at cool zone Media dot com slash sources. Thanks
for listening.
Hey everyone, it's me James, and just before you hear
the episode, i'd want to warn you that you can
hear our telephones going absolutely mental for much of this episode.
That's because as we were recording, people have found out
that SDG and E San Diego Gas Electric were restricting
access to one of the sites where migrants were.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
In need of aid.
Speaker 1 (00:21):
People were very concerned about that, so they were reaching
out to James and Jacqueline and Pedro to ask for
assistance and to me to let me know if I
could get the word out. That's why you can hear
our phones going crazy, and I think it's good that
it's in there in a sense because perhaps you can
get a sense of how mad the last few weeks
have been for everyone. Our phones have constantly be going off.
(00:45):
I'm sure mine a lot less than James and Jacquelines
and Pedros because people are overwhelmed and they need more
help than we were able to give. So consider that
background noise a blessing and I hope you enjoyed the episode.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Thanks.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Hi everyone, it's me James today and I hear again
to talk about the border today. I'm joined by some guests.
I'm joined by James and Jacqueline from Border Kindness, who
we've heard from before, and I'm also joined by Pedro
Rias from the American French Service Committee. If you guys
would like to introduce yourself and explain the kind of
role you play along the border, that'd be wonderful if
(01:21):
we start with Pedro, because folks haven't heard from him before,
that would be great.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
Great.
Speaker 4 (01:25):
Thank you James, and it's such an honor to be
on the show together with folks from Border Kindness, James
and Jacqueline. It's great to see you again. My name
is Pedro Rios. I'm director of the American Friend Service
Committee's US Mexico Border Program, which is a Quaker based
human rights organization. I've been on staff now for twenty
years working in San Diego on border issues and it's
(01:49):
been a whorldwind of two decades of work being able
to follow this topic. Our work primarily focuses on border
issues and we have four components, one of which is
documenting civil and human rights abuses that occur when contact
goes awry between primary federal immigration authorities with members of
(02:14):
civil society, including migrants and order community residents. Documentation could
be case evolving abuse of practices, abuse of policies, cases
evolving abuse of authority, and so on and so forth.
We also do a lot of policy analysis and advocacy
(02:35):
at the local level, at the state level, and at
the federal level, trying to hold agencies accountable, making them
more transparent, ensuring that there are oversight mechanisms and how
they operate. And that's done in conjunction with several coalitions
at the county wide level in San Diego, but also
(02:58):
at the national level with the Southern Border Communities Coalition
and other organizations as well. And then we obviously work
in allyship with a lot of other organizations that have
campaigns of mutual interest, some of which have been going
on for a long time, such as the Friends of
Friendship Park and trying to gain access public access to
(03:22):
Friendship Park, which currently is being impacted by the construction
of two thirty foot border walls. And we also work
directly with community members and providing information about what the
rights are, how they can become and our leaders in
their own communities, and how they can be active in
(03:43):
straightening their communities and providing guidance to other people who
might be in the same circumstances. So in a nutshell,
that's the work that we do.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
Yeah, great, it's very important work.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
And then James and Jacqueline, do you want to explain
Folks are familiar I think with border kindness from the
pre this episode, but like, maybe what have you been
doing in the last I can't remember two weeks like
since people started being held out in the open again.
Speaker 5 (04:11):
So in our organizations kind of always evolving with like
the evolving needs of the border, and over the last
I want to say, like years in particular, we've really
started to emphasize our services being present in the rural border.
We're based in Mahikali, primarily, our water drops are generally
(04:31):
in the Imperial Valley region, and we started to extend
our services to the rural community in San Diego County
with regards to like day labor, providing aid to micro
community that's living in rural communities. So all that to say,
when the border appeared to be having one of its
(04:52):
episodes of chaos, what's happened in the last couple of
weeks with folk being detained between the walls down in
sanny Siedrol and then folks being you know, just dumped
out into the street at the transit centers if we've
been seeing all over Sandygo County. We sort of held
(05:14):
off because we knew this was going to happen in Hakuma.
This is kind of one of those sixth sense kind
of things, like when you see the writing on the
wall and it was like only a matter of time
before people ended up pushed into rural San Diego County,
and unfortunately that has been the case. So we were
actually out in the desert doing a water drop and
(05:37):
heard that that impact had occurred and there were hundreds
of people in Hakkumba. So we've been out there providing
aid ever since.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Yeah, so perhaps we could describe these. So there are
like three things I think people would benefit from knowing about.
One is the detention of people between the walls in
sanny Cedral, which I think Pedro has seen a lot
of I've seen and we've seen each other down there
several days. The detention of folks in the open desert
in Hakumba, and this this dumping of migrant to various
(06:08):
transit centers across the county. Those are the three things
a week we've seen, like in massive numbers.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
This last couple of.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Weeks, so preps, we could start with explaining her Cumba
and then Pedro can take on explaining the other two
because I know he's been responding to those. So can
you just tell us, like what you saw, the number
of people, the conditions in which they're being held, and
that kind of stuff.
Speaker 6 (06:32):
Yeah. Usually, well we're seeing now. I mean now it's
currently what today? What isday?
Speaker 2 (06:40):
Wednesday? So I know it is.
Speaker 6 (06:43):
Yeah, yeah, well this morning I asked Jacke on what
day it was, because it just seems like a broken blur,
you know, the day out. But we are on Wednesday night.
That's Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. Every day so far we
have noticed a revolving door of roughly two and fifty
(07:09):
spread out between one to three camps every day. There's
a camp on the east side in Hokomba, There's a
camp that's on the west side of Hokkumba, and then
there's a camp that's just outside Hokomba and Boulevard that
seems to be the biggest camp right now. That camp
is the largest one because it's kind of hidden. You
(07:33):
got to drive down from the main highway. You have
to drive, you know, at least fifteen minutes you know,
down some dirt roads, back roads, you know, past ranches
and stuff like that to get to that open air camp,
where the other ones, especially like we saw in May,
were more like wide open, closer to the towns, closer
(07:55):
to visibility, closer to highway access. And so what we've
noticed is that that speaking with the locals and seeing
for ourselves that every day the camps that are more
visible are having less people coming in and they're being
taken out faster. And so that part, I think is,
(08:17):
you know, could be done for a multitude of reasons.
But the camp that's hidden and out of you is
the one that seems kind of strategic and seems calculated
on a greater level that as people are being loaded
up on vans or buses to be taken out for processing,
almost the same amount of people gets walked in to
(08:40):
that camp from the actual border by border patrol. So
it it's definitely an odd situation that's going on there.
It seems definitely calculated orchestrated and something that you know,
we feel that will be going on for quite a while.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Yeah, let's let me talk about that, right, Like people
are crossing and then being being transported, like you say,
on foot by Border Patrol to the camp. That's your understanding,
right to that camp in in near Boulevard.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
I'll say, I don't want to give the exact.
Speaker 6 (09:11):
Location, correct, Yes, So we witnessed that as well. We
witnessed on Monday night that we were there to help
distribute food and warm supplies, and I think a total
of five or six Border Patrol vans had, you know,
about one hundred people or so lined up and loaded
(09:34):
up onto those vans. And then right as they were
getting ready to have the last two vans leave, we
saw in the distance, in the opposite direction, Order Patrol
their truck driving behind a group of roughly eighty eighty
five new migrants coming in on foot. Yeah, right around
(09:56):
there's a gap in the fence.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Yeah, I saw people walking in. I was there the
day before you guys, So I was early as I
was the early Monday morning, and I saw the same thing,
like you know, sort of just after dawn. I couldn't
make out who was walking home just because it was dark.
Can you explain briefly, and then then we'll move to
to Pedro's situation. Can you explain the services that are
provided for them by Border Patrol, and then what is
(10:21):
provided for them by volunteers.
Speaker 5 (10:24):
By Border Patrol. It's essentially nothing. When this occurred in May,
we heard that most people were receiving an eight ounce
bottle of water daily, not really distributed in an organized manner. Currently,
we're observing that people are when they arrive, they're at
times provided with a sixteen ounce bottle of water and
(10:46):
potentially a little proddler sized pack of goldfish crackers. Border
Patrol is not providing any other continued services food, shelter, sanitation,
anything like that. Those things have all been organized at
a community level by a variety of organizations such as
(11:07):
ours that's comprised of just regular people. So it's the
government's task of managing a humanitarian crisis.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
They have.
Speaker 5 (11:22):
Like really outsourced it to the general community of supporters.
So they have taken not just the role of not
having any responsibility towards caring for migrants in like the
most basic manner, but it also seems like they have
come to expect the general community to come in and
(11:44):
fill the gaps that they're not meeting. So Border Patrol
is not providing them with anything. It's everyday regular people
that are showing up with blankets, food, water, hygiene items.
It's getting really cold, so people are distributing warm clothing, diapers, formula,
anything that people need is being provided by the community.
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (12:06):
Yeah, that's a good summary, I think. So, Pedrick, could
you explain how the how the situation is in sanny
Edra and then also at the transit centers and it's
a pretty similar situation, I think.
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Yeah, sure, I'll start with Sunny zero and the location
where community members and organizations have set up is known
as Whiskey eight. There are at least three other locations
that we know where encampments have formed. One is Whisky four,
which is close to the Las America Shopping Mall. It's
an outlet mall closer to the port of entry, and
(12:39):
then about a mile west of Whiskey eight there's Spooners Mesa,
and then close to that there's ninety one X. The
Spooners Mesa is primarily where the men's encampment is has
been arranged, and this happened back in May. There is
an incident where Border patrol decided to to move all
(13:01):
the single adult men and walk them marched them essentially
about a mile up a hill and then up another
hill to get to Spooner's Mesa. After some advocacy last week,
we convinced super Patrol to allow two of us to
go up there to feed about anywhere between three hundred
(13:21):
and eighty and four hundred men. And it took us
over an hour, about an hour fifteen minutes to feed
all of the men. Fortunately, we just barely had enough
food for all of them. This was in the evening
and as we were driving in and driving out, all
we could see was milar blankets strown about, and that's
(13:43):
all that was up there. And these were the men
that were these milar blankets down in Whiskey eight. How
community members and organizations have arranged the solidarity support stations
have been in four set So you have the charging state,
you have the medical supplies and other item station, then
(14:04):
you have the food station and then the water station.
And so we try to maintain the medical supplies. The
food station is available only when we have enough food
to provide substance to everyone there. We don't want to
create a situation where we only serve half of the
people or a quarter of the people. And then the
other people go hungry, and mind you, it's important to
(14:25):
point out that when people arrive there, they are hungry,
they are thirsty. Some of them have scrapes because they
scale the primary border barrier and injure themselves. Others are
wet because they walked through the canal to get to
that location. I've also witnessed on several locations where a
border patrol will tell people who are injured to walk
(14:48):
towards our location because they tell them that that's where
we will provide them with medical care. Now, I think
it's important to mention that under customers in a border
protection which is a parent agency of the Border Patrol,
under their national standards for how they are supposed to transport, escort,
(15:08):
detain and search people under their custody, they are obligated
to feed, to provide water, to provide shelter, to treat
medical urgencies. Anytime that individuals are under their custody. There
is some back and forth. Orbitral locally will say that
individuals are not under their custody until they are being transported,
(15:32):
even though they will provide them with a wristband or
bracelet in some cases tell them to remove their shoelaces,
direct them to where they should be walking, yell at
them when they're not forming in lines in order to
be picked up, sometimes throw a fit and will not
pick people up even though they're supposed to be there
(15:53):
to do that because people are not in lines as
quickly as it should be. All of this to several
of our organizations in the cake that border patrol at
some to some degree has people under their custody and
as such is violating the these national standards because it's
(16:14):
not meeting their needs at any level. Besides maybe the
bottle of water might provide and the one or two
granola bars they provide per day.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
If even that, Yeah, I think it's the national border patrol.
Pio also claimed to me that they were not detaining
people and that people were free to quote return to Mexico,
which like these people, I'm from Mexico and in many
cases and like I think the first day, maybe I
saw you speaking to one family who come from Mexico,
(16:46):
but the vast guority of people weren't, and there'd also
be entering Mexico between ports of entry because they're in
the United States at this time. So yeah, it's just
not that those people are like, there's there's lots of
evidence that they're being detained, even if they say they're not.
(17:12):
What then happens to those people? We've all seen it, right.
These vans pull up. They generally process people in a
certain order, which is to take unaccomplited miners and women
who are alone with children, and then families and then
single adults. What happens to them once they get on
that van? Do we have a clear sense of that
(17:34):
where they end up.
Speaker 4 (17:35):
They will be taken to any one of several borbaitral
stations for processing. And it's that processing stage where most
of them who are in these locations are there because
they want to present themselves to the authority and begin
an asilum claim, and so it's how they answer the
(17:56):
questions while being processed that they get tracked, mostly for asylum.
There are some that will be quickly removed from the
country expeditiously, but most of them will be tracked for asylum.
They will be given a court date when they should
show up, and that court date the court location depends
(18:17):
on where their final destination will be. Technically, Mexicans can
only be detained for forty eight hours non Mexicans can
only be detained no more than seventy two hours, So
within that detention period, they then are being transported to
one of four locations in San Diego County, two of
which are in San Diego, the Santy Zero Transit Center,
(18:40):
in the IRIS Transit Center, one in Oceanside, and the
other in Alcohol. And so we're seeing the majority of
the people being transported to saniny Ero and to IRIS,
and that's where colleagues with other sister organizations are leading
the charge to try to support them with seeing in
charging phones, providing food, clothing, getting them to the airport,
(19:04):
getting them transportation, getting them housing, and as much as
limited as that's possible, trying to connect them with lost
family members. Because families have been separated, there are adult
children eighteen nineteen who also are trying to figure out
where their family members are. And in some cases, as
a conversation I had with them men from Venezuela, he
(19:24):
had no idea what city he was at either though
he was in San Diego, and so trying to make
that type of arrangement and clarification is always challenging as well.
Speaker 1 (19:35):
Yeah, and obviously also expensive, right, Like these things all
place burdens on like your donation network, and both in
sort of the community in general. And perhaps we can
talk about like, because the scale of support that's been
provided by the community is extremely impressive, and given how
many people have already come through this sort of not
(19:57):
detention detention system, perhaps both you could talk about like
the support you've been able to provide and how people
who are not in San Diego can help you continue
to provide that support.
Speaker 5 (20:12):
So the first day that we heard of folks coming in,
because obviously it's interesting because border patrol, like Pedro says
like they're claiming that these people are not under their care,
but they're very much acting as if they're under their
detained care. They're telling people that if they call an
(20:34):
ambulance to seek medical care, as we observe, they say, well,
that's going to affect your case if you leave. And
so people are very much under the deliberate impression that
they are being detained, but they're not being cared for
in the most basic way. And so we first responded
on Saturday. By Sunday we were there with five hundred
(20:55):
meals that went very very quickly, providing shelter items for
people so tarps. Hakumba is a very rugged desert terrain.
There is no shade in these areas, so people are
making sort of like makeshift shelters, but there is nothing
(21:15):
shielding them from the sun, which is really unrelenting all
day and it gets up to the nineties. So we've
been providing tarps, pop ups, that sort of thing, so
people are not becoming sick from overexposure. We're providing hygiene items,
we're providing just basic needs. And that gets incredibly expensive
(21:38):
because if it was a static situation, such as in
May when there was eighteen hundred to two thousand people,
that was a huge undertaking that also took a lot
of community collaboration to meet the needs of so many people.
But this time around, as James says, it's like a
revolving door of hundreds and hundreds of people. So it's
taking hundreds and hundreds While at any given time there
(22:02):
may be only and I say only two to three
hundred people, that doesn't mean that to only two to
three hundred people needed to be fed that day. It's
that you know that is who is there at that time,
and when people arrive, as Pedro said, like they haven't
eaten in days. We talked to people that said that
they took two days to walk to Hakumba. So if
(22:24):
they arrived to Tijuana without much food in their belly
and then they're having to walk for two days, they're
arriving starving and begging for food and not being provided
with absolutely anything. So if it wasn't for all of
the organizations that are showing up and taking sort of
shifts to feed people, there would be nothing for them.
(22:46):
And we have absolutely no idea how long this is
going to go on. It could be over today, it
could go on for months year. I mean, we really
don't know what to expect. And organizations are being relied
on to provide you know, life sustaining care for people,
but we're not being communicated with from border patrol as
(23:10):
to basically anything, what the outlook is, what the numbers are,
what the updates of how the situation is going to evolve.
So every day is a surprise and we need to
have resources to be able to meet the needs of
that day. It's incredibly like consuming of every resource including
time and gas is six dollars a gallon.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
Yeah, now you need to drive your truck right because
like you can't get to some of the locations, Like
I know, I have a bigger truck and looks of
my friends about to catch a rye with me because
the cause can't make it.
Speaker 5 (23:44):
The exactly like, we have people that have gas efficient
low priuses and stuff, and they're going to bottom out
out there. So we have our huge lifted jeep that
you know doesn't get as much gas mileage as something,
but it's also going to be able to get the
supplies out there. So every aspect of it is incredibly
consuming of resources and we don't know what to expect.
(24:09):
It's not it's hard to budget. You don't know what
I expect. So the community has obviously come together in support.
But then it's like, well, how do we manage this
when we don't we can't forecast what's going on, So
it's tough. It's definitely tough. We need sustained support.
Speaker 6 (24:31):
If I may add on that, as Jacquelin said, the
people are showing up hungry, heavening for days. You know,
we get reports that you know, people are showing up
just begging for food, and the federal government more specifically DHS,
more specifically CBP Border Patrol know this there's trying to
(24:54):
stall people out at whatever the endgame is, and maybe
it's just another arm of you know, prevention through the
two parents. It's cruel. It's on purpose. People you know
are are the ponds and whatever, you know, game is
being played and it's cruel and that's you know, we're
(25:14):
doing what we can to try to offset that as
much as possible, but cruelty is definitely.
Speaker 2 (25:19):
They're all across the border.
Speaker 1 (25:31):
Just to kind of upbuild on what James said, like,
I think it's very easy for this construct of migrants
to like always be like this sort of demonized other
Fox News and KUSI and all these outlets do that
very well. But I think it's really important to like
the people who were being cruel to, Like I saw
a lady breastfeeding in the desert on Sunday night. I've
(25:52):
seen grandparents, I've seen people who are eight months pregnant,
little children like these aren't like people who have done
anything wrong, and they just for whatever reason they're coming
here doesn't really matter. They don't deserve to be treated
like that. And like James said, it's something of an
induced Like I've been to natural disasters all over the world,
(26:15):
and reported on those and seen those, and I've been
to refuge camps all over the world, But like it's
some big of a unique to the US problem that
our federal government can click its fingers and induce a
humanitarian crisis and then like hold its hands up in
the air and say we can't help you like that,
Like aside from dictatorial regimes and places I've reported in,
(26:38):
like the people don't governments don't do that very often.
And like James said, it's these people who paid the price,
it's not us for the most part. Peder, could you
maybe explain a little bit of how American French Service
Committee has been able to respond and the resources you've used,
and how you can help make this a little bit
less painful for the people who are being held in
(27:01):
between defenses.
Speaker 4 (27:02):
Sure, learning from the experience that we had back in March,
April and May, we heard a few weeks ago that
there were people lined up in an area that we
could not see from the US side, but could be
seen from the Mexican side, just west of the Sandy
Sea Port of entry, with people wearing and using Milar blankets.
(27:23):
And so the Milar blankets were an indication to us
that people were there for probably longer than four hours,
and so we kept monitoring that, asking colleagues in Tikwana
to inform us if they had seen any other groups
like that, and off and on over the past month
there were reports of that and it wasn't until about
two weeks ago that someone said that they were there
(27:43):
for a long period of time. So last last week
we set up what we called an observation post at
Whiskey eight so that we could determine for ourselves how
long people were there, what sort of needs they might have,
and how to respond whether to set up the solidarity
support stations again and quickly we determined that that's what
(28:07):
we needed to do, so we call our colleagues from
other organizations when or to set up. Opula for instance,
has been extremely helpful and leading the charge in different places.
The Appreciate Collective so Mutual Group also has been extremely
important in having their people out there, and Friends and
Friendship Park also has been important. So all these organizations
(28:29):
that responded quickly and started to build from the experience
that we had back in late spring setting up these
stations to charge phones. Phones are lifeline for people and
back in may or Patrol threatened us and they said,
if you want to keep feeding people, you can't be
charging their phones. And so we said, well, we're going
(28:52):
to have to keep charging phones because people need them.
And fortunately Borbu backed off then and now it's part
of what we do right. We charge phones, and they's
how people are able to communicate with their loved ones,
especially if they've been separated. Feeding people is just as
much as we're able to even if it's just a sandwich,
even if it's a warm meal, that we're able to
(29:16):
get through the bars or the secondary border barrier. That
could mean the difference between someone staying healthy or someone
becoming seriously ill. Bandaging up small cuts could relieve someone
from getting an infection, identifying when medical emergencies pop up,
(29:38):
so an eighth month pregnant person who is suddenly having
labor pains and having a needing to call nine to
one one, for instance, or insisting with por patrol that
the one month old child cannot remain overnight in between
border walls, and just insisting and insisting and insisting insisting
(29:59):
that the to port parties that they have there need
to be serviced, for instance, And so all of this
advocacy is happening at the same time that our colleagues
and allies are also feeding people, and the constant communication
with different elected officials pushing on them to take charge
and to respond has been one of the different aspects
(30:24):
of our response to what is a humanitarian disaster that
has been slowly evolving, i would say, over years and years,
because human migration isn't centered around humanitarian needs and human rights.
It's been centered around enforcement, around militarization, around cruel deterrence,
(30:46):
as James was talking about, which creates conditions where people
are led to suffer. And that's what we're seeing right now,
people suffering because of how this has been manufactured, how
immigration has been dealt with, regardless of who's in the
White House, over and over and over, and so now
(31:06):
we're challenged to respond to these humanitar needs in ways
that are stretching our limits, but we're able to do
it and hopefully lifting up the dignity of people that
are placing under these terrible, inhumane conditions.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
Yeah, I think it's very important to give people a
little bit of dignity as much as we can. One
thing that you mentioned that we haven't spoken about we
should is elected officials and local federal state government. How
much support, if any, have either of these sites received
from people in elected office.
Speaker 4 (31:42):
You know, we have had support from Senator step Balia's office.
That's been to me impressive to see how much interest
there is, how much advocacy there is from staff from
that office. We have not necessar there we had much
support from congressional or federal senators. We have not seen
(32:06):
them really on the ground. There is a responsibility I
believe that the County of San Diego has to meet
some of these challenging circumstances at the transit centers. They're bocking,
I feel, and to the detriment of people who need
these services and need the support. I believe the San
(32:30):
Diego Police Department has been suggesting where people should be
dropped off and not listening to folks on the ground
about how the Irish station should be central and not
dividing the drop offs between Irish and saney Ceso, for instance.
So there's a lot of a lot of necessity for
(32:50):
local governments to be coordinating with state and federal governments,
and that's lacking, again to the detriment of people who
are cut in the middle.
Speaker 1 (33:00):
How about James and Jack And have you seen any
sort of government support.
Speaker 6 (33:05):
No, not at all. I've you know, heard through channels
of you know, sources that work for the county and
they claim that they're handcuffed or that it's Border Patrol's responsibility,
and then Border Patrol is saying it's the county's responsibility,
and it just it seems like appointing fingers. No one's
(33:30):
trying to take you know, responsibility for it. And maybe
that's because it's going to be something that's going to
go on for a while. It's not something that either
wants to you know, take on the responsibility of. And
you know you've seen county supervisors speak out against it,
pushing the blame. People are here, this is San Diego County,
(33:54):
this is the United States. Someone needs to take care of,
you know, the people here. That's that's the role of government.
That's why people pay taxes for you know, for services
and services need to be provided for. You know, we
pay taxes so other people can get services as well.
Citizens non citizens like that.
Speaker 4 (34:12):
To me, it seems so easy.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean that's.
Speaker 6 (34:18):
That's everything that you've been told. But everything that you're
not seeing, you know, in practice. So I mean, this
whole thing is to us on the ground. It seems
so simple of how it should be done. But like
you know, anytime, and we've spoken on it, I think
on the last episode as well, like money's big issues.
Going to spend all this money, they need to make
(34:39):
sure that their money is going in the right pockets
that they wanted to.
Speaker 1 (34:42):
Yeah, Like I was sitting out in her cumber with
a colleague and we got overflown by a uh sixty
black Hawk, like a Border Patrol helicopter, and it just
hovered around checking us out, and like it's just so.
Speaker 2 (34:58):
I don't know, it's just.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
So depressing to see this helicopter which costs millions of dollars,
which are thousands of dollars just to take off next
to the border wall, which got twelve million dollars a mile.
And like on the same day that the San Diego
City Council filed an amicus brief in this case of
the Supreme Court to allow it to further criminalize and
house people. We have all these resources and we're just
throwing them. As Pedera said, enforcement and criminalization of the
(35:21):
most marginalized people in our communities rather than giving a
thirsty person bottle of water or like a little baby blanket.
And yeah, it's really hard.
Speaker 5 (35:33):
It's one of those agents over time of the day
could literally feed everybody there. Yes, we're all like, you know,
calculating calories per dollar of like the mule and trying
to get like every single dollar to stretch because we
don't know how long this is going to go on,
because we know that public perception and interest is something
(35:58):
that is not sustained. And purpose too, because for instance,
Border Patrol is claiming and they were on what outlet
was it.
Speaker 6 (36:08):
CBS CBS eight local San Diego said, I need to
report that the Kumba capture cleared. There's no one's there.
I just you know, I had to step away from
this this recording for a few update that there are
people still showing up. There's trying to get cleared out
as quick as possible as people show up because it's
(36:29):
in the public eye. But also now the power company
is threatening legal action and criminal action against any aid
orgs or people they show up.
Speaker 2 (36:40):
Oh great, cool, that'll be fun.
Speaker 1 (36:42):
Yeah, I mean, yeah, the reporting on this has been poor,
even more poor than it was in May. I'll say,
like out in Hookumbaya, it's hard to get to. James
and I both spent a decent junk of yesterday morning
trying to direct people how to not get lost out there.
But like I think, more pertinently, when there is not
an election or like a narrative that migration fits in,
(37:04):
it gets certainly by national outlets forgotten. With the end
of Title forty two in May, I think everyone had
their like sort of doomsday op eds in the weeks beforehand,
and then that that didn't actually happen in the way
that it had been sort of like quote unquote experts
who don't come to the border very often had predicted
(37:26):
it would, and so folks turned up, especially at Whiskey eight,
and did this sort of crisis story. But we haven't
seen that this time, and.
Speaker 5 (37:36):
You know, now it's appearing really different because, like you
see sort of the management by border patrol of the
situation in order to sort of shield the public from
like the true level of the crisis. So in claiming
(37:57):
that Boomba has been cleared, I suppose that's technically correct
if they're referring to the you know, they're relying on
reality in order to so people, the average everyday person
that's not immersed in this is going to read that
and be like, oh good, it's been cleared, because like,
my family back home knows a lot of like really
conservative folks outland Pear Valley, and like even the most
(38:17):
conservative people I knew back in May were like, oh
my gosh, how could they have babies out there in
the desert. That's so horrible. And people had, you know,
a lot of really strong emotions to seeing families huddled
in the desert for a week. Now it seems like
there's a really deliberate management of like the pr with
(38:39):
respect to this situation. So yeah, like relying on the
technicality of Hakumba being cleared because the main camp in
town has been cleared, but ten fifteen minutes away, there's
still hundreds of people, And we're the ones that are
out on social media screaming into the void into each other. Hey,
this is still happening, people, are you know, there's an
amputee out here whose leg is bleeding. There is someone
(39:02):
out here who hasn't had his heart medication for a week.
Like those kind of situations are occurring still, while the
report and the public reception is like, oh hahkum has
been cleared. It's all good. So unless somebody is like
already involved, they're generally not hearing about it. And I
think that's on purpose too.
Speaker 1 (39:19):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think it's Yeah, that's a very
that's a very niche technicality. It might not be within
the boundaries of the town of a cumber but like
people are still being corraled in the desert with no services, right,
and that that's what we should care about, not which
districts they're in or what have you. So I think
people have probably had why now that things are bad
(39:41):
and we don't know how bad they will be, and
then maybe they'll get worse, maybe they'll get better, and
hopefully they'll want to support. So how can people do that?
Like what resource? Like what I guess the concrete actions
can they take? Where can they give you money? How
can they send you supplies? If they want to volunteer
in there in the county, how can they do that?
And what kind of following is I'm nice needed?
Speaker 6 (40:01):
Yeah for border kindness. Monetary donations are the biggest help
that allows us to meet current needs, daily needs. We're
on venmo at border dash Kindness Cash app at border
Kindness Cash. They'll info at border Kindness dot org.
Speaker 5 (40:22):
Volunteering volunteering is pretty sensitive, We're not We understand that
our team is already incredibly taxed, so we do need
support in terms of like food preparation and getting supplies
out there, transporting supplies. But it is a very sensitive situation,
(40:46):
so we do want to I don't know if vet
or we want to be able to talk to the
people that want to volunteer. So certain expectations that they
may have accep certain needs that we may have are
all communicated really clearly. So the organization alo very amazingly
(41:10):
agreed to help us with that task of screening volunteers.
So people, if they are wanting to do so and
come out to Hakumba to email volunteer at alotro Lado
dot org.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
Perfect, Yeah, that's pretty good.
Speaker 5 (41:29):
Yeah, I'll I'll send you that info and they can
just say like what are they interested in doing, where're
located and that sort of thing, and then we'll be
in touch. Primarily, I mean more than anything, like twenty
dollars is a tarp to cover a family and keep
somebody shielded from the wind. We can feed a lot
(41:50):
of people with one hundred dollars. So financial support is
the most direct way. Even though it's not necessarily always
feasible for people, it is the most efficient way for
us to be able to buy items in bulk.
Speaker 1 (42:06):
Yeah, I think even five bucks, right, like, maybe that's
two people, and it really makes a day to have
a whole meal.
Speaker 4 (42:11):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 5 (42:12):
Yeah, anything helps.
Speaker 1 (42:14):
So yeah, people can definitely do this. How about for
American French service cannit be better? How can people donate
volunteer help?
Speaker 4 (42:21):
Yeah, I mean I would. I would also stress what
Jacqueline said in terms of vetting people and volunteers, it's
you know, it's not it's not easy work, and we
want to make sure that when people are volunteering that
there's a certain level of emotional strength that people are
able to have. It's very tough for work, and at
(42:42):
the same time make sure that what we're doing does
not negatively impact those that we are presuming to want
to help, right, And so that's important. I think going
through those channels, if you you know the folks that
are leading the the work at the transit centers, check
(43:03):
in with them, first, but then there are other things
that could be done. The other day, someone showed up
with twenty boxes of pizza, you know, a very useful
easy way to support connecting with people and finding out
what the needs are. That's another way. If if you
would rather purchase the tarps yourselves, for instance, do that
(43:24):
and then we can pick them up. We can find
out how to meet and pick pick up those items.
If you want to donate, there are multiple organizations doing
this work. I believe someone was working on a list
to produce for us. Going on the website a f
C dot org and being sure that you find our
(43:45):
locations San Diego, so that our program then receives that
donation directly. If the program goes to the overall a FHC,
we won't see it. So just be very mindful of
when you're donating to a f C AFC dot org.
First locate sending your program office and then find the
donate page on there so that we can be assured
(44:06):
that you are sending it to our program. Or you
can definitely contact me and I could also assist you
with that.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Yeah, I think it's great. I think it's important that
both of you sort of centered with regard to volunteering,
that there are organizations that exist to serve volunteers through
facilitating like a service experience to them, and that that's
not what is happening here, Like this is about serving
people who are very vulnerable, so like there has to
be some kind of vetting process and people have to
(44:35):
understand that, like that's part of keeping those people safe
and that's why that's happening. So yeah, thank thank you
very much for this. We'll keep covering it obviously, and
I really hope people can find some resources to donate
because it's been very taxing financially and all these groups
and on our community generally. Is there anything else you
(44:58):
guys would like to share before we finish?
Speaker 2 (45:00):
Yep.
Speaker 4 (45:01):
The only thing I would add is that, you know,
pressing the authorities. That's the other way if you are
able to connect with the county, you know, your county
supervisor in San Diego, press on them that they have
a responsibility and an obligation to respond to this in
a way that supports people who need to support And
(45:23):
that's where I would I would push towards.
Speaker 1 (45:25):
Yeah, I'll add to that that having spoken to people
in the county and in state office, Like if you call,
that makes more difference. So and if you email, so
if you have the time to make a phone call,
that could help a lot. Anything else from you, James Jacqueline,
That's what.
Speaker 2 (45:41):
I can think of.
Speaker 6 (45:41):
I mean everything changes daily, so if we were to
record them so every single day, I'm sure I can
come with something new.
Speaker 2 (45:46):
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (45:47):
For people to stay clued in with channels of communications
such as this podcast that are actually with people on
the ground and share that with their community is really important.
Like we're already getting like some social media kind of comments.
I mean it happens every time about how we're aiding
and abetting people breaking the law, but it's the government
(46:08):
breaking the law. They're breaking international asylum law. And it's
really important for people who aren't as versed in all
of this to stay aware of that that everybody who
is presenting for asylum has a legal right to do so,
not that it matters, I mean they have, like it's
a humanitarian right, yes, But for people who are very
(46:30):
concerned with legality, or at least they lean heavily on legality,
presenting for asylum is illegally protected right. And that's something
that is actually being cut short by the government in
violation of that.
Speaker 1 (46:51):
Yeah, I think you're right. It doesn't really matter. Like
I already don't give a shit about.
Speaker 5 (46:54):
Like come back for people that really about it.
Speaker 3 (46:58):
You know.
Speaker 1 (46:59):
Yeah, it's good to it's good to remind them that
they are wrong, both morally and legally.
Speaker 4 (47:04):
Exactly.
Speaker 2 (47:04):
Yeah, So what would your.
Speaker 1 (47:06):
Social media spa if people wanted to keep up to
date with what's happening?
Speaker 5 (47:10):
Border Kindness on Instagram tends to have the most up
to date common I mean shares of like what we're doing,
and that will have updates in our stories and our
posts of how to help what's going on.
Speaker 2 (47:26):
How about you, Pedro.
Speaker 4 (47:28):
We're we're terrible with our social media, but you can
definitely find some of our work there a f C
San Diego. Just look for a f C San Diego
minus Pedro Consos Pedro mostly on on Twitter, some ig
and I'll be updating some items later today.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
Perfect. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (47:51):
One more question, because people contacted me in May to
ask if they could donate amiles to facilitate travel for
folks after they've been paroled into the Is that something
that AFSC can do?
Speaker 4 (48:05):
There is another organization I'm not sure that's what you've
just mentioned now.
Speaker 3 (48:09):
The Miles for Migrants, Yeah, Miles for Yeah absolutely absolutely
a wonderful organization and that we've used through some of
our other assist or organizations and getting people to their
final destinations.
Speaker 4 (48:22):
I would say that might be the best way right now.
Speaker 1 (48:24):
Okay, Yeah, so that's the thing people can do if
they happen to have a setup plus of those. And great,
thank you so much for your time. I know you're
all extremely busy. I appreciate it. And yeah, hopefully people
listening will find a way to support if they can.
Speaker 4 (48:37):
Thanks guys, great, thank you.
Speaker 2 (48:44):
It could happen here as a production of cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
cool Zonemedia dot com or check us out on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 5 (48:56):
You can find sources for It could Happen here, updated
monthly at cool zone Media dot com slash sources. Thanks
for listening.
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Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
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