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EL PASO, TEXAS. Karina Breceda shows us around the shelter that she has been running since November. The bare cement floors are covered in cartons of cereal and bars of drink.
She accepts pregnant women and their families.
– For me, it doesn’t matter if Biden is re-elected or Trump comes back, she says. They pursue the same inhumane policies against migrants.
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We happen to be interviewing her on the same day that President Biden and ex-President Trump are visiting various parts of the wall in Texas to attract voters who want an end to uncontrolled immigration.
– Nothing but political theatre, says Karina Breceda mockingly. They are just trying to fire up their respective followers. I see no real difference between them.
The fallout from Trump’s policy of keeping asylum seekers waiting in Mexico prompted her to take the first steps toward setting up a shelter.
– I saw so much human suffering that I didn’t think existed in the affluent United States.
“Instead of building more walls, we should solve the social situation,” says Karina Breceda.
For just over a year, she has been running a large shelter in Ciudad Juarez, El Paso’s neighboring city on the other side of the border, and a smaller one in El Paso, which is located right by one of the border bridges.
“They get desperate”
At the shelter in Mexico, families with newborn children live who, via an app, try to get an agreed time to apply for asylum and thus avoid taking the dangerous route across the border river Rio Grande.
– Many have waited for eight months without getting an appointment, she says. Finally, they become desperate and try the dangerous route.
Two who have done it are Peter, 25 and Angie, 19 from Venezuela. Their son was born three weeks ago while they were trying to cross the border.
The border guards did not believe Angie when she said she was in pain and at first refused to let her in. Only when she was close to death was she allowed in and rushed to hospital where she gave birth by caesarean section. She was close to losing her child.
Peter tenderly holds son Juan Jose in his arms, wrapped in a thin blanket. The barely month-old baby looks up at us sleepily.
– It took us three and a half months to get from Colombia, where we first fled, to the American border, says Peter. I had to find temporary jobs in many cities we came to in order to collect money for the next leg of the trip.
Despite the fact that the wife was heavily pregnant, they walked long distances or sneaked on the roof of the train. They hiked through the notoriously dangerous Darien Gap in Panama where they were robbed.
Now they have received protection at Karina’s shelter Casa Mares. The family lives in a dark, windowless room that is almost entirely occupied by a large double bed. They have almost no possessions.
Pregnant women have no right to care
They hope to stay in the US but don’t know how that will go.
– We can only hope, says Angie and shrugs her thin shoulders.
In another room sits Margie, 35, from Colombia. She is heavily pregnant and depressed. Border police arrested her husband when they crossed the wall. He will likely be deported.
– I am trying to get a refugee lawyer to take on the case and try to get the husband released, says Karina Breceda while trying to comfort Margie, who is due to give birth in four weeks.
The shelter on the El Paso side is not large.
– Actually, I only have room for eight people. But I have had as many as 35-40 residents here at the same time when the refugee flow was at its most intense. But it is unsustainable in the long run.
“We prioritize pregnant women or women with small children who are most vulnerable,” says Karina Breceda.
Everything is financed with private donations.
– I don’t want to get the state involved, says Karina. I don’t want anyone to be able to complain about their tax dollars going to us.
Pregnant women who come here as refugees have no right to care in the United States. The state hospitals admit them only if they need urgent care.
– I often go with the women to the emergency room and they are denied care because they do not judge it as life-threatening.
Rolls out the sleeping bags
I ask why someone pregnant tries to make the dangerous journey over the wall. Peter and Angie say the situation in their home country became untenable when Colombia wanted to send them back to Venezuela.
But the fact that the children born here become American citizens is also a factor. Many believe that it will help them stay.
– It used to be like that, confirms Karina Breceda. But it is no longer a matter of course.
Churches and other organizations operate a large number of shelters in El Paso, relieving the federal and state authorities.
The Sacred Heart shelter usually advises Karina when women come to them who are pregnant. It is a much larger shelter that is also very close to the border.
We get there late in the afternoon when a line of refugees has gathered outside waiting for the shelter to open for dinner. Some have rolled out sleeping bags in a house niche on the other side of the street.
Roberto, 25, is one of those waiting. He crossed the border back in December but has remained in El Paso trying to save money before traveling to a relative in Nashville.
– I don’t want to be a burden to him, explains Roberto, who usually gets temporary hits at various construction sites, even though it is actually illegal for him to work.
“Went through three layers of barbed wire”
The salary is low, but as long as he can eat and sleep at the shelter, he can still save some money.
He has been given time for an asylum interview in 2028. An indication of how long the waiting times for an asylum application can be.
– In that time, I manage to work a lot, even if in the end I don’t get to stay, he says, smiling broadly. He is full of self-confidence and sure that somehow he will be able to stay in the United States.
– I think I have a lot to contribute.
Roberto is very honest about why he came to the US from Colombia.
– I saw on TV how the Americans surround themselves with so many nice and expensive things. A standard of living that I also want. Therefore, I decided to cross the border.
But it was a painful experience. Roberto takes his left hand out of the pocket of his black jacket and shows a bunch of small scars that run all over his hand.
– I went through three layers of barbed wire, he says. The wounds were very difficult to heal.
Back at the women’s shelter, Karina Breceda tells us that she fears that what she is doing could soon become criminal. A few weeks ago, a law was passed in Texas, SB4, where voluntary organizations can be held accountable if they provide assistance to migrants.
Can be considered a criminal
Annunciation House, one of El Paso’s oldest shelters, is accused by the state of contributing to the increase in immigration by providing shelter and a meal to refugees. Those who run the shelter can be sentenced to long prison terms for aiding and abetting human trafficking.
So far, Karina’s shelter has not received any visits from the police, but she fears that in the future she too may be considered a criminal.
– A law like this makes people afraid to help. For me, that would mean that I can’t drive a pregnant woman to the hospital without committing a criminal act. I wouldn’t even be allowed to call an uber for her.
A judge has temporarily suspended the law while it is reviewed for constitutionality. As seen much else in the US, in the end it is the courts that decide.
Karina is still more concerned about the militia groups that exist in Texas and those who come here from the rest of the United States.
– They harass and threaten the refugees, she says. On social media, they threaten to shoot people as a way of trying to discourage the refugees from coming here.