February 14, 2023 • 18 mins
This week Latino USA shares the first episode from the Valle de Sueños podcast.
We launch Valle de Sueños on Our Lady of Guadalupe feast day to honor those who have journeyed and kept their resiliency, faith, and love despite the treacherous path to citizenship. Our Lady represents strength, hope, and access to a kind, loving world, which represents the dreams of those who sacrifice their lives as migrants.
In episode 1, our host Laura Peña introduces the binational community of Matamoros, Mexico, and Brownsville, Texas from her perspective as a borderland native. After providing contextual background of the complex humanitarian situation at the beginning of the new Biden Administration, she begins telling the story starting on Day 1 of the humanitarian operation to close the Matamoros refugee encampment. Would the first group of migrants be allowed into the U.S.? The listener is left in suspense.
You can subscribe to Valle de Sueños here.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ola Latino USA listener Gomstas. It's Maria Rosa and today
I want to share with you a podcasts that we've
been listening to here. It's called Maye Lisuenos or Valley
of Dreams. It's from our colleagues at Benya Podcast. The
podcast follows a group of migrants who, under the former
Trump administration, were forced to stay in Mexico while their
(00:24):
asylum requests were processed in the US. Under the Migrant
Protection Protocols you know, they're known as the Remain in
Mexico policy. Thousands of people have lived for months, many
for years, in extreme and dangerous conditions while they wait.
Amid efforts by the Biden administration to end the program,
twenty seven people were chosen to cross into the US.
(00:47):
In this first episode of Vaye Lisuos, host Lauda Beena,
an attorney, activist and originally from the US Mexico border,
is going to tell that story. But what seemed like
a long awaited happy ending was not what they imagined
it to be. Here's Lauapina in Byasunos.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
In this episode, we explore the first day of the
humanitarian effort in Matamotos and Brownsville, that fateful day, twenty
seven people were chosen to be the first to realize
the dream of finally entering the United States to seek
protection and start a new life. This story is critical
(01:30):
now more than ever. For the first time in two years,
a judge has ordered that the entire US Mexico border
reopened after being closed under a public health emergency order.
On December twenty first, twenty twenty two, maybe even after
you're hearing this podcast, the US government will be ending
this policy, known as Title forty two. The policy shuttered
(01:54):
the border and expelled hundreds of thousands of migrants back
to dangerous conditions in Mexico go or unilaterally expelled them
to their home countries. This story is one example of
what can happen when there is political will, international cooperation,
and an engaged by national border community. As you listen
(02:15):
to these stories, think about scaling this cocktail of priorities.
Think about a vision for a better, more dignified, and
welcoming border that centers humanity. What transpired in February twenty
twenty one is less than perfect, but offers us insight
into potential solutions to our migration challenges at the border. Prologue.
(02:44):
It was Wednesday, February twenty fourth, twenty twenty one, around
ten pm. I was at home. I remember the miraculous
lifting of my dog, tired spirit and weary body. I
felt an anxious excitement. It was such a foreign feeling
to possess after four years of horrifying policies targeting people
in the borderlands. The next morning I would be visiting
(03:07):
the refugee encampment in Matamodas, Mexico. It was a day
that would mark the beginning of the end. I looked
over my notes one last time and thought about what
had brought me home in the first place. After nearly
twenty years in Washington, d C. In California, I returned
to my small border community in South Texas to try
and make a difference. As my dogs curled up at
(03:30):
my feet, I hoped that tomorrow would be an opportunity
to make that difference and at least one migrant refugee community.
Speaker 3 (03:38):
We were overjoyed that we were going to at last
see our friends, that we were going to see them
on our soil.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
That is Andrea Rudnick from Team Brownsville. Team Brownsville is
a grassroots humanitarian aid organization founded by a group of
local teachers.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
I know the people in the encampment felt they were
incredibly excited. Was just a lot of partying, a lot
of excitement, a lot of joy.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Matamotos is the second largest city in the state of Tamaulipas, Mexico,
with a population more than double the size of its
US sister city, Brownsville, Texas. Matamotos and Brownsville are so
close in proximity to each other that sometimes when I
ride my bicycle along the river, I can smell the
food coming from Matamotos homes, hear kids yelling as they play,
(04:28):
and see laundry drying in the wind. But for the
massive intrusion of a border wall, the Rio Grande River
or Rio Bravo, flows through one bi national community. As
the border began to tighten in the mid nineteen nineties,
our binational community began seeing divisions slowly percolate on both
sides of the river. By twenty ten, crime and insecurity
(04:49):
had become so ubiquitous to Matamotos that many residents of
the city opted to move to the US side. In Brownsville.
Migration patterns along the border had always ebbed and flowed,
but the harm full treatment of migrants took a turn
for the worse under Donald Trump.
Speaker 4 (05:04):
There is a.
Speaker 5 (05:05):
Ruling humanitarian and security crisis at our southern border. Every day,
customs and Border patrol agents encounter thousands of illegal immigrants
trying to enter our country. We are out of space.
Speaker 6 (05:19):
To haul them, and we have no way to promptly
return them back home to their country. My administration has
presented Congress with a detailed proposal to secure the border
and stop the criminal gangs, drug smugglers, and human traffickers.
This is the tragic reality of a legal immigration that
(05:41):
I am determined.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
To Under the law, people seeking asylum at official ports
of entry are allowed to have their claim heard in
the safety of the US. But just months after the
images of parents and children being violently separated at the
border had shocked the collective consciousness of a Mayormerricans, the
Trump administration ruled out yet another assault on immigrant lives,
(06:05):
and they did it on a technicality. The Immigration and
Nationality Act as a set of federal laws that govern
immigration in the United States. There's an obscure line in
the fast tracked Deportations section that states an official may
return a non citizen to foreign territory contiguous to the
United States, in this case Mexico. Because let's be honest,
(06:29):
nobody in the Trump administration was worried about immigrants coming
from Canada. But let's focus on the most important word
in that line. May may return a non citizen, not must,
not shall may. The word itself is permissive, meaning optional,
(06:50):
not mandatory. By subverting that narrow, discretionary language, the Trump
administration built an entirely new deportation system that penalized migrants
by forcibly returning only Spanish speaking non citizens entering from Mexico.
The policy was called the Migrant Protection Protocols and became
more widely known as Remain in Mexico. This policy forced
(07:12):
thousands of people to wait months between their asylum hearings.
Over the course of nearly two years, more than sixty
eight thousand migrants were sent back to Mexico without food, shelter,
or any regard for their safety. Along the river in Matemotos,
hundreds of men, women, and children built lives in a small,
tense city, trying their best to create a sense of
safety and normalcy for themselves. In spite of their circumstances.
(07:36):
Here is Anhelolvo, a human rights defender and local attorney,
and describing them Matamotos Encampment.
Speaker 7 (07:41):
My name is Angelo Lo Garcia. I always is both
in last names in honor of my mother and my father.
I'm from Puerto Rico. First, my background has always been
being involved in whatever has to do with social justice,
social components. I feel myself that I'm luggy enough to
have a lot of opportunities, So how can I make
(08:04):
that change so that everyone has that opportunity. They're just
differing aspect of how to describe them campman itself. You know,
physically it's not a pretty sight. You have tents there,
you have a lot of people, like in a very
small space.
Speaker 8 (08:26):
There was no space even to walk around in that plaza.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
This is my friend and attorney Jody Goodwin. She started
as a volunteer with Team Brownsville and became the first
lawyer in Matamoros to provide legal aid to migrants early
in the Trump era.
Speaker 8 (08:41):
And then there was no other place for them to go.
Speaker 9 (08:43):
So then they started to go up onto the levee,
and the levee got full, and then they started to
go down onto the banks of the river, and it
just kept growing and growing and growing because there was
nowhere else for them to go. And I think people
stay right there near the border because they were afraid
(09:04):
to go anywhere else. Matamotos is a very very dangerous
place for anyone, but it's even more dangerous for migrants
just because of their vulnerability to be to be kidnapped.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
But as dangerous as Matamotos was for the recently arrived,
it was not without some glimmers of community, hope, and dreams.
Speaker 7 (09:29):
The other thing that you cannot perceive is the stories
and make the camp what it was in between like
this probably horror. They came together and build something, and
then you have restaurants, you have tanditas, it's the little stores.
So that gives like a sense of like there's a
(09:52):
lot going on, but there's community and people are looking
for each other.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Many advocates on the US side of the border had
been together under the banner of the Rio Grande Valley
Welcoming Committee, groups like Team Brownsville, Angry at Tiasiavoelas, and
Sidewalk School for asylum Seekers. What they all had in
common was that they were people who wanted to make
a difference and bring some sense of dignity to a
completely undignified situation. The next morning, I made my way
(10:23):
to the encampment. As I dropped my four quarters into
the turnstile to cross the bridge and walk from Brownsville
to Matamotos, I thought back to an earlier zoom call
I had with Biden White House officials and other government agencies.
Something had clicked with the Biden folks. There was movement.
The Matamodos encampment had come to symbolize the Trump administration's
(10:44):
mistreatment of migrants, and there appeared to be political will
to reverse course to end remain in Mexico and shut
the Matamotos encampment down. We had agreed to meet by
the dumpsters on the Mexican side of the border. I
kept an eye out for the turquoise t shirts I
had Quit designed for our group. A white dove in
the middle of the shirt bore the name Comite de
(11:05):
bien Venida Welcoming Committee. We stood there, waiting and wondering
who would be able to cross today. Over months of
working in the camp, we had grown close with many
of the residents. We knew the impossible situations they were
fleeing and held out hope that they'd soon be on
their way to safety. Here's Jody Goodwin.
Speaker 8 (11:27):
That very first group that crossed. There was a specific
family they had taken in, a Cuban woman. She had
to lee Rey Noosa because her her cousin was shot
and killed by border patrol. And when I got there
(11:48):
and I saw her name on the list, I was
so relieved that she was going to be able to cross.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
Around the camp. Jody became affectionately nicknamed Lauerrauola, the Blonde Lawyer,
and as a first group of asylum seekers gather, she
led some of them in prayer. Meanwhile, I could see
Sister Norma Pi Mendel from Catholic Charities of the Rio
Grande Valley directing people clipboard in hand. The irony of
the lawyers leading prayer and the religious leader directing logistics
(12:17):
was not lost on us. Sister Norma was no stranger
to the ins and outs of coordinating mass efforts from migrants.
For years, Catholic Charities has been right in the middle
of humanitarian efforts, providing temporary shelter and assistance to thousands
of people.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
My name is Sister Norma Pi Mendel and I am
Director for Catholic Chariteys of the Rio Grande Valley. Catholic
charitys is the charble arm of the Catholic Church, and
so what we do is respond to in collaboration with
other entities, in addressing the needs that we see here
in our community, especially people who fall between the cracks
(12:57):
that are not able to receive the system or helped any.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
In twenty twenty, Sister Norma was named one of Time
Magazine's one hundred most Influential People in America. That same year,
Pope Francis called her by name and essentially described her
as the hand of God. But today she stood in
her simple navy habit and open toad sandals, anxiously watching
the clock with the rest of us.
Speaker 4 (13:23):
It was hard to truly take in the intensity of
the moment, you know, and what we were all part of,
because we lived through all those months with them and
knew them and their struggles, their fears, all that their
kids suffered, you know, and it all was at that
moment that started on that first day and continued on
(13:45):
for the rest of the week. Was sort of of
a validation of humanity. Walking together, holding hands crying.
Speaker 7 (13:55):
It was beautiful.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
The International Bridge is flanked by a pair of iconic
red and today they shone brightly under the sun. Everyone
lined up in a specific order, and Sister Norma, Jody,
myself and you and humanitarian aid workers escorted the group
across the bridge. Emotions ran high as I stood by
a twelve year old girl and her mother. When we
began walking, a reporter with a camera jumped a small
(14:17):
barrier and got in the little girl's face. What are
you feeling now that you are being allowed into the US?
I pushed the camera away and urged the girl to
keep walking.
Speaker 8 (14:26):
We're crossing the bridge. We're actually gonna be able to
get these people out of significant danger. MPP really really
really is ending. They're going to come out on the
other side. This, this is happening like it was like elation.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
As we came to the end of the bridge, we
could see the inspection area, where another group of US
immigration officials were posted. For many of us growing up
along the border, crossing into the United States was little
more than a formality. You walk up, show your identification,
answer a few boilerplate questions about bringing in fruits or vegetables,
(15:02):
and be on your way. People would cross to eat dinner,
fill prescriptions, get dental work, visit family, or go drinking.
It was part of the regular rhythm of life. But
for the immigrants crossing today, the border had become an
impenetrable wall, not of metal and concrete, but of bureaucracy
(15:23):
and procedure. Sister Norma was ahead of us and entered
the inspection station with the first group of men, women
and children, But as Jodie and I approached, we were
stopped dead in our tracks and told no lawyers.
Speaker 8 (15:37):
It was so infuriating because having had so many calls
and discussions with people at the very top levels of
the administration from the White House letting us know that
we can be in the tents where they were processing
people so that we could make sure that any issues
that came up were to be handled, to be able
(16:00):
to be monitored, et cetera. Yeah, the troops on the ground,
they never got that message. They were never going to
get that message, and it also became apparent that there
was nothing that the White House could do about that.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
As attorneys, this set off all kinds of alarms and
red flags. We had seen firsthand the horrible abuses the
US immigration system was capable of, especially when they thought
no one was looking. These migrants had come so far
and endured unimaginable difficulty to get to this point, and
it felt like it could all come undone at the
(16:34):
whim of an official inside at tent, we could not enter.
All we could do was wait and hope. While we waited,
Jody and I did what any other same Texan would
do with some time to kill. We went to Whataburger
if you know?
Speaker 7 (16:50):
You know?
Speaker 2 (16:51):
We walked into the bus station with our greasy fries
and the iconic bright orange and white paper bags. Rows
of tables were set up with welcome signs the parking
spot where the bus was set to arrive with the
first group of migrants. The friars turned cold, and I
suddenly lost my appetite as we waited for the immigration
process to play out. Why was the process taking so long?
(17:14):
What if the US officials changed their minds? I tossed
the bag of fries into the trash bin and sat
down next to Jodie. I thought about the twenty seven
people whose lives were in the hands of just a
few border agents, the one woman whose cousin had just
been shot and killed by a border patrol agent. I
thought about the mother and daughter duo clinging to each
(17:34):
other as they crossed the bridge. As anybody in immigration knows,
sometimes the most painful part of the journey is.
Speaker 7 (17:41):
The wait.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
On the next episode of Via Li Suenos.
Speaker 8 (17:48):
And they had to make the choice, you know, do
we all stay here because he had already lost his case,
or do we let you know, mom and daughter cross
and leave dad and in the can.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Via the Suenols is produced by Selina Pena, Charlie Vela,
and Me, made in partnership with Rucha RGV edited an
original theme composed by Charlie Vella, written and hosted by
Me Laura Pena, with artwork by Monica Lugo. Music in
this episode is courtesy of Epidemic Sound. For full track listing,
check the show notes. For more information about Via the Suenos,
(18:26):
please visit us online at Viasuenos dot com with a
regular end
Ola Latino USA listener Gomstas. It's Maria Rosa and today
I want to share with you a podcasts that we've
been listening to here. It's called Maye Lisuenos or Valley
of Dreams. It's from our colleagues at Benya Podcast. The
podcast follows a group of migrants who, under the former
Trump administration, were forced to stay in Mexico while their
(00:24):
asylum requests were processed in the US. Under the Migrant
Protection Protocols you know, they're known as the Remain in
Mexico policy. Thousands of people have lived for months, many
for years, in extreme and dangerous conditions while they wait.
Amid efforts by the Biden administration to end the program,
twenty seven people were chosen to cross into the US.
(00:47):
In this first episode of Vaye Lisuos, host Lauda Beena,
an attorney, activist and originally from the US Mexico border,
is going to tell that story. But what seemed like
a long awaited happy ending was not what they imagined
it to be. Here's Lauapina in Byasunos.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
In this episode, we explore the first day of the
humanitarian effort in Matamotos and Brownsville, that fateful day, twenty
seven people were chosen to be the first to realize
the dream of finally entering the United States to seek
protection and start a new life. This story is critical
(01:30):
now more than ever. For the first time in two years,
a judge has ordered that the entire US Mexico border
reopened after being closed under a public health emergency order.
On December twenty first, twenty twenty two, maybe even after
you're hearing this podcast, the US government will be ending
this policy, known as Title forty two. The policy shuttered
(01:54):
the border and expelled hundreds of thousands of migrants back
to dangerous conditions in Mexico go or unilaterally expelled them
to their home countries. This story is one example of
what can happen when there is political will, international cooperation,
and an engaged by national border community. As you listen
(02:15):
to these stories, think about scaling this cocktail of priorities.
Think about a vision for a better, more dignified, and
welcoming border that centers humanity. What transpired in February twenty
twenty one is less than perfect, but offers us insight
into potential solutions to our migration challenges at the border. Prologue.
(02:44):
It was Wednesday, February twenty fourth, twenty twenty one, around
ten pm. I was at home. I remember the miraculous
lifting of my dog, tired spirit and weary body. I
felt an anxious excitement. It was such a foreign feeling
to possess after four years of horrifying policies targeting people
in the borderlands. The next morning I would be visiting
(03:07):
the refugee encampment in Matamodas, Mexico. It was a day
that would mark the beginning of the end. I looked
over my notes one last time and thought about what
had brought me home in the first place. After nearly
twenty years in Washington, d C. In California, I returned
to my small border community in South Texas to try
and make a difference. As my dogs curled up at
(03:30):
my feet, I hoped that tomorrow would be an opportunity
to make that difference and at least one migrant refugee community.
Speaker 3 (03:38):
We were overjoyed that we were going to at last
see our friends, that we were going to see them
on our soil.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
That is Andrea Rudnick from Team Brownsville. Team Brownsville is
a grassroots humanitarian aid organization founded by a group of
local teachers.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
I know the people in the encampment felt they were
incredibly excited. Was just a lot of partying, a lot
of excitement, a lot of joy.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Matamotos is the second largest city in the state of Tamaulipas, Mexico,
with a population more than double the size of its
US sister city, Brownsville, Texas. Matamotos and Brownsville are so
close in proximity to each other that sometimes when I
ride my bicycle along the river, I can smell the
food coming from Matamotos homes, hear kids yelling as they play,
(04:28):
and see laundry drying in the wind. But for the
massive intrusion of a border wall, the Rio Grande River
or Rio Bravo, flows through one bi national community. As
the border began to tighten in the mid nineteen nineties,
our binational community began seeing divisions slowly percolate on both
sides of the river. By twenty ten, crime and insecurity
(04:49):
had become so ubiquitous to Matamotos that many residents of
the city opted to move to the US side. In Brownsville.
Migration patterns along the border had always ebbed and flowed,
but the harm full treatment of migrants took a turn
for the worse under Donald Trump.
Speaker 4 (05:04):
There is a.
Speaker 5 (05:05):
Ruling humanitarian and security crisis at our southern border. Every day,
customs and Border patrol agents encounter thousands of illegal immigrants
trying to enter our country. We are out of space.
Speaker 6 (05:19):
To haul them, and we have no way to promptly
return them back home to their country. My administration has
presented Congress with a detailed proposal to secure the border
and stop the criminal gangs, drug smugglers, and human traffickers.
This is the tragic reality of a legal immigration that
(05:41):
I am determined.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
To Under the law, people seeking asylum at official ports
of entry are allowed to have their claim heard in
the safety of the US. But just months after the
images of parents and children being violently separated at the
border had shocked the collective consciousness of a Mayormerricans, the
Trump administration ruled out yet another assault on immigrant lives,
(06:05):
and they did it on a technicality. The Immigration and
Nationality Act as a set of federal laws that govern
immigration in the United States. There's an obscure line in
the fast tracked Deportations section that states an official may
return a non citizen to foreign territory contiguous to the
United States, in this case Mexico. Because let's be honest,
(06:29):
nobody in the Trump administration was worried about immigrants coming
from Canada. But let's focus on the most important word
in that line. May may return a non citizen, not must,
not shall may. The word itself is permissive, meaning optional,
(06:50):
not mandatory. By subverting that narrow, discretionary language, the Trump
administration built an entirely new deportation system that penalized migrants
by forcibly returning only Spanish speaking non citizens entering from Mexico.
The policy was called the Migrant Protection Protocols and became
more widely known as Remain in Mexico. This policy forced
(07:12):
thousands of people to wait months between their asylum hearings.
Over the course of nearly two years, more than sixty
eight thousand migrants were sent back to Mexico without food, shelter,
or any regard for their safety. Along the river in Matemotos,
hundreds of men, women, and children built lives in a small,
tense city, trying their best to create a sense of
safety and normalcy for themselves. In spite of their circumstances.
(07:36):
Here is Anhelolvo, a human rights defender and local attorney,
and describing them Matamotos Encampment.
Speaker 7 (07:41):
My name is Angelo Lo Garcia. I always is both
in last names in honor of my mother and my father.
I'm from Puerto Rico. First, my background has always been
being involved in whatever has to do with social justice,
social components. I feel myself that I'm luggy enough to
have a lot of opportunities, So how can I make
(08:04):
that change so that everyone has that opportunity. They're just
differing aspect of how to describe them campman itself. You know,
physically it's not a pretty sight. You have tents there,
you have a lot of people, like in a very
small space.
Speaker 8 (08:26):
There was no space even to walk around in that plaza.
Speaker 2 (08:29):
This is my friend and attorney Jody Goodwin. She started
as a volunteer with Team Brownsville and became the first
lawyer in Matamoros to provide legal aid to migrants early
in the Trump era.
Speaker 8 (08:41):
And then there was no other place for them to go.
Speaker 9 (08:43):
So then they started to go up onto the levee,
and the levee got full, and then they started to
go down onto the banks of the river, and it
just kept growing and growing and growing because there was
nowhere else for them to go. And I think people
stay right there near the border because they were afraid
(09:04):
to go anywhere else. Matamotos is a very very dangerous
place for anyone, but it's even more dangerous for migrants
just because of their vulnerability to be to be kidnapped.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
But as dangerous as Matamotos was for the recently arrived,
it was not without some glimmers of community, hope, and dreams.
Speaker 7 (09:29):
The other thing that you cannot perceive is the stories
and make the camp what it was in between like
this probably horror. They came together and build something, and
then you have restaurants, you have tanditas, it's the little stores.
So that gives like a sense of like there's a
(09:52):
lot going on, but there's community and people are looking
for each other.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Many advocates on the US side of the border had
been together under the banner of the Rio Grande Valley
Welcoming Committee, groups like Team Brownsville, Angry at Tiasiavoelas, and
Sidewalk School for asylum Seekers. What they all had in
common was that they were people who wanted to make
a difference and bring some sense of dignity to a
completely undignified situation. The next morning, I made my way
(10:23):
to the encampment. As I dropped my four quarters into
the turnstile to cross the bridge and walk from Brownsville
to Matamotos, I thought back to an earlier zoom call
I had with Biden White House officials and other government agencies.
Something had clicked with the Biden folks. There was movement.
The Matamodos encampment had come to symbolize the Trump administration's
(10:44):
mistreatment of migrants, and there appeared to be political will
to reverse course to end remain in Mexico and shut
the Matamotos encampment down. We had agreed to meet by
the dumpsters on the Mexican side of the border. I
kept an eye out for the turquoise t shirts I
had Quit designed for our group. A white dove in
the middle of the shirt bore the name Comite de
(11:05):
bien Venida Welcoming Committee. We stood there, waiting and wondering
who would be able to cross today. Over months of
working in the camp, we had grown close with many
of the residents. We knew the impossible situations they were
fleeing and held out hope that they'd soon be on
their way to safety. Here's Jody Goodwin.
Speaker 8 (11:27):
That very first group that crossed. There was a specific
family they had taken in, a Cuban woman. She had
to lee Rey Noosa because her her cousin was shot
and killed by border patrol. And when I got there
(11:48):
and I saw her name on the list, I was
so relieved that she was going to be able to cross.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
Around the camp. Jody became affectionately nicknamed Lauerrauola, the Blonde Lawyer,
and as a first group of asylum seekers gather, she
led some of them in prayer. Meanwhile, I could see
Sister Norma Pi Mendel from Catholic Charities of the Rio
Grande Valley directing people clipboard in hand. The irony of
the lawyers leading prayer and the religious leader directing logistics
(12:17):
was not lost on us. Sister Norma was no stranger
to the ins and outs of coordinating mass efforts from migrants.
For years, Catholic Charities has been right in the middle
of humanitarian efforts, providing temporary shelter and assistance to thousands
of people.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
My name is Sister Norma Pi Mendel and I am
Director for Catholic Chariteys of the Rio Grande Valley. Catholic
charitys is the charble arm of the Catholic Church, and
so what we do is respond to in collaboration with
other entities, in addressing the needs that we see here
in our community, especially people who fall between the cracks
(12:57):
that are not able to receive the system or helped any.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
In twenty twenty, Sister Norma was named one of Time
Magazine's one hundred most Influential People in America. That same year,
Pope Francis called her by name and essentially described her
as the hand of God. But today she stood in
her simple navy habit and open toad sandals, anxiously watching
the clock with the rest of us.
Speaker 4 (13:23):
It was hard to truly take in the intensity of
the moment, you know, and what we were all part of,
because we lived through all those months with them and
knew them and their struggles, their fears, all that their
kids suffered, you know, and it all was at that
moment that started on that first day and continued on
(13:45):
for the rest of the week. Was sort of of
a validation of humanity. Walking together, holding hands crying.
Speaker 7 (13:55):
It was beautiful.
Speaker 2 (13:57):
The International Bridge is flanked by a pair of iconic
red and today they shone brightly under the sun. Everyone
lined up in a specific order, and Sister Norma, Jody,
myself and you and humanitarian aid workers escorted the group
across the bridge. Emotions ran high as I stood by
a twelve year old girl and her mother. When we
began walking, a reporter with a camera jumped a small
(14:17):
barrier and got in the little girl's face. What are
you feeling now that you are being allowed into the US?
I pushed the camera away and urged the girl to
keep walking.
Speaker 8 (14:26):
We're crossing the bridge. We're actually gonna be able to
get these people out of significant danger. MPP really really
really is ending. They're going to come out on the
other side. This, this is happening like it was like elation.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
As we came to the end of the bridge, we
could see the inspection area, where another group of US
immigration officials were posted. For many of us growing up
along the border, crossing into the United States was little
more than a formality. You walk up, show your identification,
answer a few boilerplate questions about bringing in fruits or vegetables,
(15:02):
and be on your way. People would cross to eat dinner,
fill prescriptions, get dental work, visit family, or go drinking.
It was part of the regular rhythm of life. But
for the immigrants crossing today, the border had become an
impenetrable wall, not of metal and concrete, but of bureaucracy
(15:23):
and procedure. Sister Norma was ahead of us and entered
the inspection station with the first group of men, women
and children, But as Jodie and I approached, we were
stopped dead in our tracks and told no lawyers.
Speaker 8 (15:37):
It was so infuriating because having had so many calls
and discussions with people at the very top levels of
the administration from the White House letting us know that
we can be in the tents where they were processing
people so that we could make sure that any issues
that came up were to be handled, to be able
(16:00):
to be monitored, et cetera. Yeah, the troops on the ground,
they never got that message. They were never going to
get that message, and it also became apparent that there
was nothing that the White House could do about that.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
As attorneys, this set off all kinds of alarms and
red flags. We had seen firsthand the horrible abuses the
US immigration system was capable of, especially when they thought
no one was looking. These migrants had come so far
and endured unimaginable difficulty to get to this point, and
it felt like it could all come undone at the
(16:34):
whim of an official inside at tent, we could not enter.
All we could do was wait and hope. While we waited,
Jody and I did what any other same Texan would
do with some time to kill. We went to Whataburger
if you know?
Speaker 7 (16:50):
You know?
Speaker 2 (16:51):
We walked into the bus station with our greasy fries
and the iconic bright orange and white paper bags. Rows
of tables were set up with welcome signs the parking
spot where the bus was set to arrive with the
first group of migrants. The friars turned cold, and I
suddenly lost my appetite as we waited for the immigration
process to play out. Why was the process taking so long?
(17:14):
What if the US officials changed their minds? I tossed
the bag of fries into the trash bin and sat
down next to Jodie. I thought about the twenty seven
people whose lives were in the hands of just a
few border agents, the one woman whose cousin had just
been shot and killed by a border patrol agent. I
thought about the mother and daughter duo clinging to each
(17:34):
other as they crossed the bridge. As anybody in immigration knows,
sometimes the most painful part of the journey is.
Speaker 7 (17:41):
The wait.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
On the next episode of Via Li Suenos.
Speaker 8 (17:48):
And they had to make the choice, you know, do
we all stay here because he had already lost his case,
or do we let you know, mom and daughter cross
and leave dad and in the can.
Speaker 2 (18:03):
Via the Suenols is produced by Selina Pena, Charlie Vela,
and Me, made in partnership with Rucha RGV edited an
original theme composed by Charlie Vella, written and hosted by
Me Laura Pena, with artwork by Monica Lugo. Music in
this episode is courtesy of Epidemic Sound. For full track listing,
check the show notes. For more information about Via the Suenos,
(18:26):
please visit us online at Viasuenos dot com with a
regular end
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