SAN DIEGO (Border Report) — People who operate shelters in Tijuana say 80% of the women who arrive at their facilities and plan on crossing the border are from Mexico.
They also say most don’t have CBP One appointments that allow migrants to cross the border and seek asylum.
“The majority are Mexican women, and this has been going on for the better part of two years, they are fleeing from violence, organized crime or domestic violence, they all have a story,” said Sister Albertina María Paoletti, director of the Madre Asunta shelter.
She says almost all the women they see plan on crossing the border to seek asylum with or without a CBP One appointment.
“Most of them arrive with the goal of crossing,” she said. “We’re also starting to see a lot more who have been deported, some arrive late in the day, might stay a night, then they try once again to get across.”
Paoletti says most of the female Mexican migrants are from the Mexican states of Michoacán, Guanajuato and Jalisco, which have been besieged by cartel violence in recent years.
“A few of them arrive with CBP One appointments, but most of them have not been successful in getting one, we try to convince them not to cross without one, but most don’t listen,” said, Paoletti, adding that in recent weeks, there has been a surge in women arrivals at their shelter and others around the region.
“We are starting to get full again, there have been times women ask if they can sleep in the garden or the patio, but we have been turning some women and their children away, we don’t want to accept anyone unless we will be able to take care of them properly, maybe this is a sign of things to come.”
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