Posts
4/27/20
DEATH FLIGHTS – 24 APRIL 2020 (please share for transparency)
ICE Air is starting to get a lot more Media and Congressional attention now. We have had a number of inquiries. Keep sharing!
12 FLIGHTS 25 Ap – 27 April
ICE Air rarely flies on the weekend, but sometimes there are plane repositioning, returns and occasionally detainee flights. That was the case Saturday – Monday this week. Monday was actually a light day for flights. Because ICE discloses nothing about these flights, we are left to our own hypotheses. Perhaps Friday was such a large day they took a day of rest. Perhaps they are facing some pressure to suspend flights until they start testing. Or, maybe they are just positioning for a big day to come. We will witness.
4/24/20
DEATH FLIGHTS – 24 APRIL 2020
23 – Let that sink in 23 FLIGHTS TODAY
Ø ICE Air was incredibly mobile today. It makes us gasp at the thought of how much COVID was seeded and spread today alone. And it makes us wonder if ICE wanted to get as many deportations done before testing protocols are put in place (see last item below), or others suspend flights.
4/23/20
DEATH FLIGHTS – 23 APRIL 2020
14 FLIGHTS TODAY
Ø Today, in the midst of the greatest pandemic of our lifetimes, we sent 129 people, including 49 children, back to Haiti, the poorest country in this hemisphere and possibly one that is the most ill prepared to care for people with COVID. It is estimated Haiti only has 60 ventilators of which 20 may work for a population of 11 million people and only 124 ICU beds. Not long ago we sent 3 people back with COVID that represented 8% of Haiti’s cases at the time.
Ø Just this week, 164 humanitarian groups signed a letter pleading to stop deportations to Haiti because of the significant health risk. ICE was deaf to these pleas and continued to deport hate.
4/22/20
DEATH FLIGHTS – 22 APRIL 2020 (please share for transparency)
Ø Our deportation of COVID and hate continued today with the 8 flights as listed below. Fewer than yesterday’s 17, but still a great deal of shuffling around the US. Guatemala flights are still suspended.
Ø ICE detainees dropped again this week by about 1,500 to 30,737. The detainee population is dropping because people continue to be deported and those fleeing danger and violence are being flash returned under the CDC Order with zero opportunity to request asylum, or, effectively request any protected status. So far, over 11,000 people have been expelled, most by land as we understand, under the Order, including an estimated 400 unaccompanied children.
Ø So, deportation by air is only part of the story. One state in Mexico, Tampaulipus, reports 100 deportations per day by land. In Reynosa, on the border across from McAllen, TX, it was recently reported that 16 migrants with COVID were repatriated or deported (6 from Honduras; 3 from Cuba; 1 from Guatemala; 1 from Cameroon and 1 unknown).
4/5/20
A REPORT ABOUT THE MATAMOROS ENCAMPMENT
As far as we know there have been no confirmed cases of COVID.
People are not mingling as closely as before the pandemic, especially in large groups. It seems as though there is much more awareness of social distancing, but as those of us who have spent time in the camp, that is very difficult do with the density of the camp and at the natural interdependence of residents in the camp.
4/1/20
As Guatemala once again ponders over its craven acceptance of deportation flights, which inevitably spread Coronavirus to their already ravaged country, and Honduras and Salvador take their human cargo, mindless of the contagion, we watch, I from an apartment in New York City, others from Texas and Ohio, eyes glued to flight manifests every early morning.
3/28/20
I am perched on the eighth floor of a building in Brooklyn in an apartment with Melissa. We have not left for several days. We have a terrace, so we can go out and feel the sun and wind, and watch the reduced traffic, automobile and pedestrian, below. When watching together, we sigh and scold to each other about those that do not observe social distancing. That’s not six feet, one of us remarks to the other. We stand together, touching.
3/27/20
Artist Iviva Olenick is working on a series called "States of Emergenc(y)e," a "textile arts and performance series advocating for opening borders and extending compassion and care to immigrants and refugees."
3/20/20
It is almost impossible to get a clear idea of what the announced changes to immigration policy will be. Listening to the president and his chorus of evil, at the Coronavirus press conference, they seemed to say or imply the following:
1. Apprehended migrants will not be held. They will be transferred to airports and flown to their own countries.
2. Mexico will not accept anyone from any third countries.
3. There will be no judicial review of this procedure.
4. No asylum seekers will be allowed to cross.
3/16/20
Travel restriction. Meaningless for deportation flights so far. No one cares about these people. Observed three busses of human beings boarded in shackles to a plane headed for Guatemala, a country that said they would restrict all incoming flights from other countries...but not deportation flights.
3/15/20
Suspended: Witness at the Border
These are hard times, and the specter of the Coronavirus hangs over the vulnerable in a way that we can barely allow ourselves to pronounce, much less write it down and make it even more real. Imagine the scenarios, the way this plays out for those trapped at the border, and in prisons that have walls, as well, and I will imagine still another that is haunting me as I write.
3/15/20
This will be the first week in over a year that I’m not making a bridge calendar [for Team Brownsville]. We’ve been told that World Central Kitchen is taking food to be distributed in small groups, that people are not supposed to be congregating anywhere. That means we’re not needed for hand washing or water duty. Team leaders may be going across to distribute goods, but we’ve been told not to take extra people unless necessary for distribution. This is for their protection as well as ours.