Towns and communities across the Southern border are bracing for the end of Title 42 and the wave of migrants expected to come with it. NBC’s Brie Jackson reports from El Paso, Texas.
Hundreds of migrants continued to arrive at the U.S.-Mexico border Thursday night in the final hours before pandemic-related asylum restrictions were set to expire.
After midnight, new rules, known as Title 8, will be in place to crack down on illegal crossings, including five- and 10-year bans on reentry for those who have been previously deported.
In border towns like Tijuana, Mexico, migrants could be seen out in the open, covering their bodies with blankets and sleeping in makeshift tents, while waiting for their asylum hearings. Some migrants have been waiting for hours, or even days, under the sun and adverse conditions to be processed by Border Patrol agents, Telemundo affiliate KUAN-LD reported.
"We're about to give up. This is already so stressful, waiting for many days, and the children can't endure this like us," Alonso Vanegas, a Colombian immigrant, told KUAN.
Along with his wife, Carolina, and their two children, aged 13 and 7, Vanegas fled his native Bogotá, Colombia, where he said he was kidnapped and threatened with death.
"I could not hide back home, dump everything or hide in another city when there were no guarantees of safety," he added.
He hopes seeking asylum in the U.S. will give his family that safety. However, the asylum-seeking process has been slow and a trench between the two fences of Tijuana and San Diego has become his home for the last two days.
“My kid told me ‘dad, this is why you brought me to the United States? To be homeless? We were fine in Colombia, it was fine,'” Vanegas said.
In San Diego, California, dozens of migrants, many of them Colombian families, slept under plastic tarps between the two border walls, while being watched over by Border Patrol agents who had nowhere to take them for processing due to overcrowding at detention centers.
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Albino Leon, 51, stated that the end of Title 42 prompted his family to make the journey.
"With the changes they are making to the laws, it's now or never," said Leon, who flew to Mexico from Colombia and managed to get past the first border wall to reach U.S. soil.
In El Paso, Texas, entire families of migrants sat on pieces of flat cardboard near a Red Cross tarp that offered some shade from the scorching Texas sun.
“I don’t know what to do... I just want to be able to find my family,” a 41-year-old migrant from Venezuela who gave his name as José, told Telemundo affiliate KTDO-TV as he stood outside Opportunity Center for the Homeless.
Jose told KTDA-TV that he was trying to reunite with his wife and 4-year-old daughter in Atlanta, Georgia, after they were allowed to enter the U.S. in April.
Homeland Security officials predict over 10,000 migrants will attempt to cross into the U.S. once Title 42 expires. However, the numbers have already exceeded expectations, as 11,000 individuals were apprehended on both Tuesday and Wednesday.
