{"id":24924,"date":"2022-02-03T09:36:56","date_gmt":"2022-02-03T17:36:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/independentlens\/?post_type=blog&p=24924"},"modified":"2023-10-02T11:37:44","modified_gmt":"2023-10-02T18:37:44","slug":"death-valley-for-migrants-the-invisible-cost-of-border-crossing","status":"publish","type":"blog","link":"https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/independentlens\/blog\/death-valley-for-migrants-the-invisible-cost-of-border-crossing\/","title":{"rendered":"“Death Valley for Migrants”: The Invisible Cost of Border Crossing"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Ivonne Spinoza<\/strong><\/h4>\n
\n

What is more important: laws or lives?<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

This is the question at the center of the immigration debate and its ramifications.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Conversations around illegal border crossings often result in the dehumanization of migrants. These are people we\u2019re talking about and, separate from conversations about the reality of immigration laws, “<\/span>no human being is ever illegal<\/span><\/a>,” as Isabel Johnston wrote in the <\/span>Immigration and Human Rights Law Review.<\/span><\/i> Actions<\/span><\/i> can be illegal, but people cannot.<\/span><\/p>\n

As a companion to the vivid documentary <\/span>Missing in Brooks County<\/i><\/b><\/a>, here we look to not only some of the jarring statistics but also the very real <\/span>details of migrants’ plights trekking north into Texas.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Route of Death<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Each

Each marker is the geolocated coordinates of a recovered body within Brooks County (2009-2019). [Courtesy Stephanie Leutert, Director of the Mexico Security Initiative at the University of Texas at Austin in LawFare Blog<\/a>, statistics via Brooks County Sheriff’s Office.]<\/p><\/div>
\nTexas is now the leading state when it comes to migrant deaths,1 <\/sup>but it wasn’t always this way. A lot had to happen over decades before it got to this point.<\/p>\n

Nowadays, most recriminations against immigration and border policies often fall on recent presidents\u2014and there is plenty to implicate leadership in the last few decades. But many say President Clinton jump-started this humanitarian crisis in 1994 when his administration launched Operations Gatekeeper, Safeguard<\/strong>, and Hold the Line<\/strong> in California, Arizona, and Texas, respectively. These measures were designed to funnel migrants into the harshest and most dangerous crossing points, hoping to dissuade them from attempting to even try in the first place. The plan was a success on the first part and, as we explore here, a complete failure on the second.<\/p>\n

As migrants were funneled to the desert, including the Brooks County area in Texas, they never stopped coming but survival became much harder. As a result, these areas have a lot more dead bodies. Texas surpassed Arizona in migrant deaths, and <\/span>Brooks County specifically reported more migrant deaths between 2012 and 2019<\/span><\/a> than any other area of South Texas.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Border Patrol Agent Alex Jara, seen patrolling Brooks County in the documentary <\/span>Missing in Brooks County,<\/span><\/i> at one point says, “We don’t call them people anymore, we call them ‘bodies.’ Because if you call them ‘people,’ then it starts getting to you.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Falfurrias,

Falfurrias, Brooks County checkpoint<\/p><\/div>\n

With a <\/span>41,4 percent poverty rate<\/span><\/a>, Brooks County is one of the poorest counties in Texas, which translates to limited resources. When combined with its location and a sandy terrain that can be incredibly challenging and exhausting for those walking for days, this helps explain why this area turned into a perfect storm for migrant deaths\u2014the \u201cDeath Valley for migrants,” as it\u2019s been fittingly <\/span>nicknamed by some press<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

A Texas migrant-crisis story in <\/span>The Guardian<\/span><\/i><\/a> recounts the experiences of Exelina, a woman who migrated from Honduras to try to reunite with family in the U.S. It vividly paints the picture of what migrants experience when attempting to cross Brooks County:<\/span><\/p>\n

The ground shifted beneath their feet\u2014in some places the sand was nearly a foot deep and carpeted with burrs. Since the last Ice Age, westerly winds had been depositing great layers of coastal sand across the inland county. It felt as if they were walking along the bottom of a vast ocean, drowning in darkness. The sand seeped into Exelina’s shoes and rubbed at her feet. Burrs covered her pants and socks, scratching her legs. Thorns tore at her arms through her thin gray hoodie. The only vegetation that thrived in Brooks County seemed designed to inflict misery: thorny mesquite, prickly pear, horse crippler cactus and cat’s claw. Mile after mile they marched through the sand, the humidity rising and barely a breeze in the air.<\/span><\/i>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

How do migrants find themselves in the middle of this harsh terrain and how do their bodies end up in Brooks County?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

While not technically on the border, Brooks County happens to be situated one county above it (Hidalgo County sits below along the border). It\u2019s where “<\/span>coyotes<\/span><\/a>“\u2014people paid to guide migrants across the border\u2014drop off migrants so they can skirt west of the Border Patrol Interior Checkpoint near the county seat of Falfurrias.<\/span><\/p>\n

It’s in the attempt to circumvent this checkpoint that leads to so many deaths, with people navigating through 40 miles of private ranches that have unwittingly become a cemetery. These ranchlands of South Texas are private property, many of them traditionally oil and gas ranches (though some have been converted to other uses, like hunting, as you can see with some ranches listed <\/span>here<\/span><\/a>). Some are as large as 50,000 acres, and often patrolled by their own private security.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
>>“Confronting the Agonizing Facts of Life and Death in Brooks County”:
\nRead more about Missing in Brooks County<\/em><\/a>.<\/h6>\n
\n

Water Rights, Human Rights<\/strong><\/p>\n

The migrant situation in South Texas has also led to a silent water war<\/span>. On one side, humanitarian volunteers\u2014including some ranchers, like<\/span> Lavoyger Durham<\/span><\/a>, ranch manager of the vast El Tule Ranch\u2014leave potentially life-saving water stations out for migrants trying to survive the desert (temperatures have reached as high as <\/span>116\u2109 in 2016<\/span><\/a>, and gone below freezing in the winter). On the other side are the ranchers and even law enforcement officials who destroy or deface the water stations.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Eddie

Eddie Canales cleans graffiti off a water station bucket<\/p><\/div>\n

Most of the (<\/span>estimated<\/span><\/a>) tens of thousands of border-crossing deaths in this area can be attributed to either exposure or dehydration. For years, Eddie Canales’ South Texas Human Rights Center (STHRC) has been working on a volunteer-based effort to keep water stations. But even the Red Cross proved to be an opposing group. The Red Cross came after STHRC for using their flags, which STHRC considered a universal symbol of aid, to mark the water stations. This is why they now use a modified red and blue cross flag design.<\/span><\/p>\n

Despite the pushback, humanitarians\u2014including veterans\u2014keep working on building water stations, even if their efforts are often short-lived in the face of those who put in the effort to sabotage them. The STHRC currently maintains 90 stations, distributed in an area of about 1,200 square miles, and uses <\/span>specific guidelines<\/span><\/a> to build these life-saving stations.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s also worth noting that \u201cno water station is set up without the complete affirmation of the owner or ranch representative of said property,” according to STHRC rules, so those who destroy them are actually invading someone else\u2019s property.<\/span><\/p>\n

Click on this interactive Google Map to learn more. You can zoom in and zoom out (for a few extra pieces of knowledge well beyond Brooks County.)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n