EL PASO, Texas (Border Report) – Day of the Dead is a Mexican tradition – often observed in U.S. Latino communities – of remembering and honoring deceased loved ones.
It involves prayer, setting up a small altar with candles and pictures of the departed, or visiting their graves at cemeteries. This weekend, one community group in El Paso is asking border residents to save a prayer for migrants who died on the way to the United States and to speak up against immigration policies it alleges force them to turn to unscrupulous smugglers.
“The (U.S.-Mexico) border for a long time has been a place with deterrence policies that are fueling the death of people,” said Alan Lizarraga, a spokesman for Border Network for Human Rights.
The El Paso-based group is co-hosting a 5:30 p.m. migrant remembrance vigil this Saturday at Armijo Park, 710 E 7th Ave.
According to the UN’s International Organization for Migration, at least 1,233 migrants died in the Americas in 2024. That includes 174 who perished in the jungle and ravines of the Darien Gap in Panama and 341 for whom the Caribbean Sea became their final resting place. Along the U.S.-Mexico border, at least 560 migrant remains were recovered that year, one of the deadliest on record.
“We want to offer our community a space of remembrance but also make an urgent call to action to our government that it is time to build a humane policy, it is time to really care about the safety of individuals and work together to find a way forward that guarantees people aren’t losing their lives,” Lizarraga said.
On Oct. 12 in El Paso, a man from Mexico and a citizen of Guatemala were killed in a vehicle crash as their smuggler was attempting to flee the Border Patrol. A few days earlier, first responders recovered the body of a migrant who spent six hours inside a storm drain after he and eight other people were abandoned by smugglers.
The Trump administration for the past eight months has been posting online messages discouraging migrants from coming to the United States illegally and placing their lives in the hands of smugglers who will lead them through dangerous places or abandon them.
Lizarraga said people fleeing death threats from gangs or are targeted by government officials or police forces in their countries don’t have much of a choice.
“There are no legal pathways to come to the United States for people that are escaping violence. Asylum is limited under this administration and that is forcing people to take alternative routes,” Lizarraga said. “These are preventable deaths and our policies should reflect the values of our country.”
In June 2024, President Biden paused asylum requests between ports of entry and directed asylum-seekers to the CBP One app to make an appointment.
In January, President Trump suspended asylum appointments under an emergency executive order and turned CBP One into CBP Home — a page where migrants already in the United States can notify the government that they are going back to their countries, in essence, self-deporting.
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