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The sun set Thursday on an all too familiar portrait of despair in the Rio Grande Valley. Some women carried crying babies while others carried bags of items to the muddy riverbank, where a group of men waited for them with life jackets to take turns crossing from Mexico to the United States. . On that day alone, authorities say, 2,000 migrants were apprehended in the valley.
“We come for a new opportunity,” said a man, who traveled with his wife and young daughter.
U.S. officials attributed the surge in part to instability in the region, exacerbated by the pandemic, and perceptions among migrants of more welcoming immigration policies under a new president.
‘We want to make a living here’
Roxana Rivera, 28, said she and her 6-year-old daughter left Honduras after back-to-back hurricanes in November destroyed her home and everything in it.
According to Rivera, the rumor was that the United States now allowed people with children to cross the border freely – which was not entirely true. She heard this on the news, she said. Relatives in the United States relayed the same information. Other migrants had similar stories.
Rivera said she was elated when the group she crossed the border with – mostly mothers and their children – was picked up by border officials. The migrants were treated and then taken to a bus station in Brownsville, Texas, where they were tested for Covid-19 and were provided by nonprofits before their release. She planned to stay with relatives in Houston while her immigration case was processed.
“You always dream of living in a house with your children,” Rivera said, getting emotional. “Now we have nothing … We dream of having a house.”
Rivera said she sometimes regretted embarking on the long journey north on foot and by train – putting her daughter’s life in danger. Sometimes the girl would ask for food and she didn’t have any to offer her. Once, she says, her daughter got dehydrated. Another time, she had to see a doctor in Mexico when her daughter had a fever.
Maria Mendoza, a 30-year-old migrant from El Salvador, appeared exhausted when she arrived in Brownsville after being treated by immigration officials. She was hoping to reunite with relatives who live in Maryland, she said, crying.
Mendoza recalled that the raft she and others were using on a midnight crossing of the Rio Grande had overturned, sending several mothers and their children into the water. She said there were days when she didn’t eat so her 6-year-old didn’t go hungry. Her daughter remembered avoiding a snake along the way.
“More than anything, I want to find my family,” she said. “We want to make a living here. A better future for our children.”
‘We have nowhere to put people’
Border officers meet between 4,000 and 5,000 people a day, according to an internal security official.
“We’re packed,” said Chris Cabrera, spokesperson for the National Border Patrol Council, which represents border patrol officers. “We are overcrowded. We have nowhere to put people.”
He added: “We have them in our custody and the system has stalled and there is no place to send them to us.”
Another part of the administration problem is unaccompanied migrant children.
On Wednesday, the number of unaccompanied children in border patrol custody reached more than 3,700, CNN learned. Many are held in prison-like facilities along the border.
The border patrol apprehended nearly 800 unaccompanied migrant children on Wednesday – exceeding the daily average of 450, according to an internal security official.
About 8,800 unaccompanied children are in the care of US health and social services, the ministry confirmed Thursday, up from about 7,700 the week before.
‘The border is not open’
Roberta Jacobson, Biden’s southern border coordinator, said the administration’s message to migrants was not the time to come.
“It’s really important that people don’t take the dangerous trip in the first place, that we provide them with alternatives to that trip, because it’s not safe on the way,” she said on Wednesday.
“And so, you know, if I could just point out … that it’s really important that this message gets out there, because the perception is not the same as the reality in terms of not opening the border.”
Jacobson reiterated the administration’s message: “The border is not open.” She said the Trump administration’s immigration policies “intentionally made matters worse.”
“We cannot just undo four years of the previous administration’s actions overnight,” said Jacobson, adding that it will take “a long time to overcome” the effects of Trump’s immigration policy.
Yet the new administration’s handling of the situation has drawn criticism from Republicans and some Democrats.
In addition to unaccompanied children awaiting immigration cases, the Biden administration continued to refuse most migrants. Some families are admitted to the United States on a case-by-case basis. A change in Mexican law banning the detention of young children has prevented US immigration officials from refusing migrant families.
In Brownsville, Sandra, 38, said she fled Honduras after years of threats from a family member. Her full name is not released as she is a victim of domestic violence. One day, she said, the relative showed up at her home with a gun and opened fire. One of her sons and other family members attacked the man and prevented him from killing her.
She lived with her son in a tent town on the Mexican side of the border last year – where she taught kindergarten students – and is now awaiting a refugee claim in the United States.
So far, a woman who runs a charity in Brownsville has opened her home to Sandra and her young son. She learned this week that she has an immigration hearing in June. Wiping away her tears, Sandra said she would never return to Honduras.
“I had to go for good,” she said. “I cannot live in my country.”
CNN’s Ray Sanchez, Priscilla Alvarez and Geneva Sands contributed to this story and Sanchez wrote in New York.
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