J. toured seven countries from Caracas to the United States. He hugged his wife on Wednesday, minutes after Washington announced new restrictions for Venezuelansyes The tears of joy soon turned into sadness: her son was on the way, but he can no longer enter.
“Last night I was happier than a child at Christmas,” J. told AFP requesting anonymity. “But when I saw the news on TikTok I immediately called my son and asked him not to continue.”
The United States Department of Citizen Security announced Wednesday that Venezuelans who enter outside its migration ports via Mexico will be returned to that country.
In return, Washington reported that 24,000 Venezuelans will be eligible for a humanitarian program inspired by the one previously intended for thousands of Ukrainians fleeing the Russian invasion.
But the quota pales in contrast to the migration statistics.
Since October 2021, US authorities have counted more than 155,000 Venezuelans entering through its southern border, more than triple the number in the previous period.
Most arrive in Texas, like J., who set foot on US soil Sunday after crossing a stretch of the Rio Grande in which the water was up to his chest.
“It was nothing compared to what I had to do to get here,” he said under the scalding sun of Eagle Pass, a Texas border city where he presented himself to authorities with wet clothes and muddy shoes.
He was carrying a backpack with a couple of changes of clothes, “I left the others on the way.” A white rosary and a holy card of the Venezuelan Blessed José Gregorio Hernández in the bag.
“On the Line”
“My wife told me ‘You entered the line!'” J. recounted now in New York. “It was the will of God. I don’t know what would have become of me if she took a little longer. It is a very painful journey, very suffered, to arrive and be returned.
Millions of Venezuelans have left their country in recent years due to the harsh crisis plaguing the nation governed for more than two decades by Chavismo.
Many made their way to Latin America, but this year the flow to the United States exploded because the country, without diplomatic relations with Caracas, allows them to enter to process asylum claims.
AFP spoke with several of them along the border in Texas this week, including five young people who left what little they were carrying when they jumped into the river pursued by authorities in Mexico and arrived barely wearing their body clothes, soaked and emotional.
Videos showing columns of people with backpacks on their shoulders making their way through dense vegetation with the hashtag #selvadarien still flooded the TikTok social network, one of the main sources of information for Venezuelans, so it is expected that thousands more will arrive in the following days.
«Terrible»
J. was recounting the trip to his 22-year-old son, who decided to leave Caracas when his father arrived but will now turn back at the gates of the Darién, the jungle plug between Colombia and Panama that has become an escape route for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans.
“I’m very sad, and so is he, because we were all going to be together finally,” says J. “But it would hurt me a lot if he made such a big effort and they returned him to Mexico, where the people are very good but the immigration agents and the policemen mistreat us a lot».
For him, the Mexican authorities are the worst part of the journey.
«In the jungle they put a bracelet on you to distinguish the one who pays from the one who doesn’t. Those who don’t pay are mistreated, but you can pay what you have if you’re alone. In Mexico, the coyote tells you ‘it’s 500 dollars’, but you tell him ‘I have 200’, he accepts it, it’s, let’s say, his job. But a Mexican police officer is going to tell you ‘there are 500’ and if you don’t give it to him, he will beat you or rob you or return you».
“They are terrible,” says L., a Venezuelan who arrived in Eagle Pass on Sunday also claiming asylum and who was reunited with her boyfriend in Georgia on Wednesday night.
To cross the jungle, L. had to pay 380 dollars to “the guides”. “It’s horrible, they kill, they rape, they steal, it’s not like you see in the videos.” To complete the last stretch from Mexico, her boyfriend had to pay $3,000. “The money is recovered,” he says, relieved to see her.
L. slept “like a lead” on Wednesday night, the first in her new home, but her boyfriend didn’t sleep a wink because his three sisters are crossing the Darien.
«I just think, I’m happy because L. is finally here, but I don’t know what I’m going to do for my sisters».
L. has a chronic illness and decided to migrate because staying in her country scared her more than the inhospitable jungle. «There are no medicines there, if I stayed I knew I was not going to make it. In the jungle at least I had a chance », she said. “For some of us, going back is not an option.”