Aboard the plane home I wear a mask. I am told it will not protect me, but it might protect other people in case I carry a virus, which I don't think I do. We don't shake hands anymore. We don't hug. We try to avoid crowds. We are tying to protect one another. We do what we can.

Predictable but still horribly disappointing:

Supreme Court says Trump administration may continue ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy for asylum seekers (Washington Post)

As several were Witnessing, Rodney came with his attorney, Jodi Goodwin. They were just before the Immigration Court. After an 8 month trial, he has been granted full asylum. He is from Venezuela and, yes, said it was very difficult in his country.

Day 58 - Witness at the Border

Sergio Cordova and Marc Mines

The grocery clerk asked about the “Free Them” button I was wearing. I explained that it referred to people who are trying to claim asylum but are being denied entry to our country. He told me lovingly about his father, who years ago swam across a river to get here from Mexico. But the clerk was not sympathetic to people who are trying to get into our country today.

Thank goodness so far we have seen no evidence here of the announced increased militarization of the border. But we will witness changes. And actions. Uncertainty remains until possibly the 11th or 12th to see if SCOTUS reviews the current status of MPP - in place in the 5th District (TX and NM) and no MPP as of the 12th in the 9th (AZ and CA).

The asylum seekers who are stuck just outside Brownsville and at other border towns in Mexico may now have a compelling reason to risk a long journey full of danger. The 9th Circuit just ruled that as of March 12 they will have a new chance of getting into the U.S. On that day, the Trump administration's Remain in Mexico policy will no longer be in effect, because the temporary stay that the court had ordered dissolves and the injunction against the policy goes into effect.

4 planes - Swiftair and World Atlantic - depart BRO today.

Turnout for the Charro Days parade seemed smaller this year than in the past, despite the beautiful weather. No doubt it's because of the difficulty people have crossing the border and the climate of fear CBP has established. People seemed more hesitant than in the past to take our signs. Nonetheless a few brave souls did take them, and we celebrate them!

What brought me to tears this time was not the airplanes we watch taking off in the early morning deporting people in shackles to Honduras and Guatemala. That gets to everyone the first time they see it. I have seen it several times.

Let’s piece together the day. Its dramatic events began with a stunning ruling by a three-judge panel on the Ninth Circuit, one that lifted a stay on an injunction against MPP, Remain in Mexico. This was news that generated a lot of hope in the immigrants rights community, and among those in the the belly of the MPP beast itself.

Day 47 - Witness at the Border
Today is Charro Days.

Our observations have suggested a couple of things. First, we have heard from more than one source that the rate of people being placed into MPP—that is, the policy that strands people in Mexican border cities while a long, drawn out sham legal process takes place—has slowed significantly. We heard this from attorneys who keep track of new MPP cases in Matamoros. And we have watched as the total number of MPP cases reported by the US government has stayed the same for three months now, 60,000 being that number.

45th Day of Witnessing at the Border

Today was my first day to #WitnessAtTheAirport. Today I ask you to join us not because the rewards you receive are greater than what you give, which they are, but because what I saw at the airport was so chilling, and so frightening that I have lost my smile. I hope that I will find it again when I cross the Rio Grande and see the children today.

Let’s talk about the courts, the ones set up in tents right at the US side of the bridge.

The judges aren’t inside, they attend by videoconference. The asylum seekers enter the tents through a back way from the bridge across the the Rio, across the border. Right about the same time as we began witnessing in Brownsville, the courts started letting observers in for what are known as calendar sessions. The calendar sessions are the ones where the judges all say yes. Yes, we will schedule a date for you to try and convince a judge that you should get asylum. That ultimate session is the one where the judges say no. You might have a few more calendar sessions along the way. But the final session, called the merits session is the the one that counts.

No, there is no asylum any more, it got canceled by the administration last year on July 15.

A most amazing thing. People just show up, from all around the country, to witness and protest the cruel impact our immigration policies are having on people stuck just across our border with Mexico.

DESAPARECIDOS

I sometimes think that people, even people who have come to the border to witness, don’t quite realize what they are seeing. It is easy to see that people are being prevented from crossing the border to safety, and are being kept in difficult conditions. And to see that there are valiant, caring efforts are being made to address some of the material needs of people in the Matamoros encampment.

Here are two things about the situation in Matamoros that are not widely discussed.

First, there are far more asylum seekers in Matamoros that are NOT at the encampment than there are in the encampment. We believe there are better than 5,000 people who have found other places to stay, including shelters and rented or borrowed spaces. We do not know about the well-being of these others who may be spending what little money they have to pay for their apartments and rooms. Some of them have found work.

We go out mornings to the airport and we watch as people who must be trembling with fear are patted down, their mouths inspected, shackled at five points, carefully watching their feet in the semi dark on the stairs into planes that will take them back south, into an abyss.

As so often now, we rise before dawn to put our eyes on a regular event, the wrenching sight of deportation, at the airport here in Brownsville. Buses, run by a transport and security company called Trail Boss, will arrive, and we will see in the windows of the buses the silhouettes of people, people who may raise their hands to show us that they see us, and that they are shackled.