Days after the United States cleared thousands of Haitian migrants from the southern border in Del Rio, Texas, some of those migrants are finding out that there are people out there who want to help.
According to the Associated Press, many of the Haitian migrants who remain in Ciudad Acuña in Mexico are receiving aid from residents of the border town. Some are taking migrants into their homes or finding them shelter. Others are providing food and water to those who have stayed behind.
Virginia Salazar, who lives in Ciudad Acuña, is one of the Mexicans helping the Haitians. She knows firsthand how difficult their situation is right now. Her husband Mensah Montant is from Togo, a country in West Africa. He arrived in Mexico nine years ago as a migrant. “I come from a family of migrants,” Salazar told the AP. “This comes naturally to me.”
Approximately 2,000 Haitians were sent back to their home country over the last week. About 250 of them were moved to an event center in Ciudad Acuña but living conditions there have been less than desirable. Gerardo Ledesma, a pastor in Mexico, brought food to the migrants staying in the shelter. “I’m seeing the need,” he told National Public Radio. “The authorities have not provided the support, until now that they have moved them here.”
When Haitian families started showing up at the home of Andrea Garcia, a hairstylist in Ciudad Acuña, she helped house six of them in different homes that her family owns throughout the city.
“They arrived at my house alone, with their babies and asked [for] help,” Garcia told the AP. “They said there was no place they could go.”
While the Haitian migrants who remain in Mexico might feel like they are in limbo, it’s encouraging to know there are Mexicans out there who aren’t turning their backs on them.