Absinthe & Cookies (a bit bitter, a bit sweet)

If They're Upset, We Must Be Doing Something Right

So the Mexican government is upset that we're deporting illegals back to Mexico away from the border. Heck, I was just happily surprised we had a deportation plan at all!

Apparently, when illegals are picked up in AZ, we're putting them on planes and taking them to towns where they can't just turn around and try for the border five minutes later. Sounds good to me. But of course, we're being mean to the poor lawbreakers.

.... "They shouldn't deport us so far away, in places where we don't know anybody," said Cesar Pinacho, 26, a cannery worker who has slept in a Ciudad Juarez park and the yard of a nearby house since he was deported several days ago.

[....]

The Mexican government has protested the U.S. practice of handcuffing migrants with a chain that wraps around their waists during the airplane ride.

"If they have to deport us, they shouldn't treat us like criminals," said Martin Romero, 38, a field worker from Durango. "It's humiliating. We're just working people."

[....]

While one of the biggest complaints is the dislocation caused by the long-distance deportations, the Mexican government rejected a U.S. offer to deport undocumented migrants back to their hometowns, at the U.S. government's expense.

Mexican Assistant Foreign Secretary Enrique Berruga said a previous program that deported migrants home in the mid-1990s was abandoned because Mexicans objected to being flown home.

"That kind of thing has been tried before," Berruga said. "I don't think anything has changed to expect any different results this time."

[....]

Juventino Gonzalez, a 28-year-old dishwasher from Chimalhuacan, near Mexico City, was a repeat offender.

He and his friend were caught in Arizona last week after trudging seven hours through the desert. Deported through McAllen, Texas, they spent the last of their money to return to the Arizona desert and try again with the same smuggler — only to be caught and deported through El Paso, Texas, across from Ciudad Juarez.

"Of course we're going to try again. We can't go home beaten and with empty hands," he said, sitting in a public park and planning his next crossing. "We're going to try and get ahead. All they are doing with this program is making our lives harder."

Posted by Ithildin at September 29, 2003 5:30 PM | PROCURE FINE OLD WORLD ABSINTHE