A small but determined group rallied outside the Long Beach Convention Center on Saturday, May 8 to demand that the immigrant children held inside be reunited with their families.
“I think being prevented from seeing your family as a young person is, I would say, that is akin to abuse,” Hoku Jeffrey, a member of By Any Means Necessary (BAMN), told the Signal Tribune.
Local organizers have criticized the federal government for taking too long to release children to their families or sponsors. According to Mayor Robert Garcia, the goal of the federal government is to reunite children within seven to 10 days of their arrival at the site, but cases can take longer.
Jeffrey also explained that unaccompanied children will continue to arrive at the southern border as long as the federal policy Title 42 is in place.
“The Trump-era policy of turning away families at the border is still in effect, and the only way that these young people were allowed to come in, is if they came by themselves,” Jeffrey said.
Under Title 42, adults and families are deported before they can apply for asylum, while unaccompanied children are taken into federal custody.
16% of the unaccompanied children screened by Immigration Defenders Law Center between December 2020 and March 24, 2021 had previously tried to enter the country with a parent or family member before attempting to enter by themselves.
“They were separated from their families at the border, and now they’re being kept from their families in the United States,” Jeffrey said.
Families who choose to wait in Mexico while their asylum cases are pending, sometimes for years, are regularly the victims of violent crime by members of criminal organizations and Mexican police officers.
The nonprofit organization Human Rights First identified over 490 reports of violent crimes against migrants and asylum seekers who had been blocked from entry or expelled to Mexico since January 2021. These include reports of rapes, kidnappings and assaults.
Jai Hudson, an attendee of the May 8 rally, had previously visited Tijuana himself to get a first hand account of the border crisis by speaking to asylum seekers.
“The process is just too slow for them and that’s why it’s so backed up in there,” Hudson said.
Protester Alyssa Bishop said that although the rally didn’t draw a large number of protesters, those who did make it weren’t just speaking for themselves.
“Each person who comes has a whole community that they’re here representing. We all have friends who weren’t able to make it, we all have families who feel this collective hurt,” Bishop said.
Bishop also said she understood that not everyone can be physically present at protests.
“A lot of people can’t be here. Friends that wanted to come– they were sick, they were busy, they were working. A lot of us can’t be present at these things because we’re working, we need to be able to make money. The fact that people can’t come, that’s fine. There’s those of us who the time works out, and we’re here carrying them forward” Bishop said.
