Some Haitian Migrants Stranded in Northern Mexico Put Down Uncertain Roots Jacquelin Belizaire and Arturo Martinez - VOA News
go to original October 6, 2017

Haitians Blocked at Border Find Home in Mexico (Associated Press)

Pierre Lumps Benoit wasn’t planning to end his northward trek from Brazil here in the border town of Mexicali last November. The young Haitian man had set his sights on a music career in the United States, but U.S. immigration officials at the southern border deemed otherwise.

So, Benoit shifted his focus. He found a place where he and his wife could live and a job managing the Jaguar nightclub. Better known as a musician named Woldo, he anticipates having a signing party there "soon," when he releases his first CD. It’s called "My Dream."

It’s "not easy to live in this country. The salary is very low," the 31-year-old said, conceding it’s still better than in Haiti. Here, "the officials welcome you like human beings, not like refugees."

He’s among thousands of Haitian migrants who, beginning in early 2016, set off for the United States. But, dissuaded by tightened U.S. immigration policy, some like Woldo have been stranded south of its border. They’ve modified their own dreams and are putting down at least tentative roots in Mexican soil.

They’ve been uprooted before. After a massive 2010 earthquake in Haiti killed at least 230,000 people and decimated the economy, roughly 50,000 left to seek work in Brazil. Some found it, including on preparations for the 2016 Summer Olympics. But when the South American country’s recession deepened, jobs dried up. Many of those Haitian migrants began heading for the United States that spring, hoping to enter under a humanitarian program, Temporary Protected Status, offered after the quake.

To deter the migrants, U.S. Homeland Security in September 2016 ended its six-year freeze on non-criminal deportations. It only briefly let up on those removals after Hurricane Matthew ravaged Haiti last October, killing at least 500 and scouring the southwest region of housing, jobs and crops.

Meanwhile, the number of Haitian migrants turned away by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s field office in San Diego, California, surged – from 333 in fiscal year 2015 to 6,377 the next year and 8,045 most recently.

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