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Posted on 08/31/2007 5:57:45 AM PDT by fweingart
The 8-year-old boy with close-cropped hair and a missing front tooth stepped off the yellow bus, looking lost and clutching a coloring book against his chest. A two-hour drive away, at the airport in the capital city of San Salvador, a man with shaggy hair and pursed lips walked off an unmarked white plane with his hands cuffed behind his back. Behind him came another 77 convicts -- most returning to their homeland for the first time in years.
The boy and the convicts had something in common: They were deportees, returned home on separate days last month.
The convicts had been booted out of the United States, and the boy, Marcos Antonio Arévalo, was the youngest of a dozen or so children -- mostly teenagers -- who had failed in their attempts to reach it.
Authorities said Marcos Antonio was caught in Mexico traveling with an unidentified adult who likely was paid to escort him to the U.S. border to join parents already settled somewhere in the United States.
While Washington grapples with the divisive issue of immigration reform, the Salvadoran government faces its own problems: accommodating those returned home on almost daily deportation flights, and watching out for children trying to start out on the risky journey north.
The overall number of deportees returned from the United States to El Salvador -- both convicts and undocumented migrants -- has almost doubled, from 7,239 in 2005 to 14,395 last year. The number includes 711 children during the two-year period.
Most of the children are caught traveling without parents or legal guardians.
Salvadoran law prohibits minors from leaving the country without a passport and notarized consent of their parents. But many are sent to join relatives in the United States with coyotes -- smugglers who escort and help sneak them across the U.S.-Mexico border for fees ranging from $3,500 to $6,500.
''When the children are that young, generally they are traveling with a relative or with a good coyote,'' said Carlos Isaac Escalón Alvarez, immigration chief in La Hachadura, on El Salvador's southwestern border with Guatemala.
Marcos Antonio had been on the road for two days before authorities in Mexico picked him up and made arrangements to return him home, authorities told The Miami Herald. The other children also had been interdicted in Mexico.
Marcos' grandfather, José Alberto Arévalo, met the bus to pick up his grandson. He declined to discuss the boy's travels, other than to say his parents had hoped to have him join them in the United States.
Large Salvadoran communities started settling in places such as California, Texas, Arizona, Florida and Washington, D.C. in the 1980s, during the bloody civil war in El Salvador. .
The overwhelming number of repatriations doesn't involve children but ''criminal aliens,'' who completed their sentence in U.S. jails for offenses that range from drugs to murder, as well as undocumented adult migrants caught in the United States.
Improved cooperation between U.S. and Salvadoran authorities is in large part responsible for the hike in deportations, officials on both sides say.
''We have been working with El Salvador to speed up the deportation process so people aren't languishing in [U.S.] detention centers,'' said Rebecca Thompson, a spokeswoman at the U.S. Embassy in San Salvador.
BRIGHT FUTURE
Salvadoran authorities say some of the deportees could have bright futures, especially in the construction and tourism industries.
''My administration is trying to find a way for the noncriminals to find a job,'' said Rafael Alvarez, director of the country's immigration agency. ``They have a lot of skills, experience with construction, painting, restaurants -- and they know English, too.''
More difficult to assimilate are the convicts who arrive on special flights from the United States at least once a week. Authorities say many are members of U.S.-based street gangs -- and they blame them for adding to the high number of homicides and other violent crimes in El Salvador attributed to gangs.
On a scorching Friday last month, a planeload of inmates disembarked at the airport in San Salvador.
The man with the shaggy hair, who authorities said had lived in Stuart, Fla., was arrested on a Salvadoran warrant. The charge: killing his Salvadoran wife two years ago by stabbing her 56 times.
Those deportees not facing charges are greeted at the airport by immigration officials who offer them traditional cheese-filled corn patties known as pupusas and information about laws and overall life in El Salvador as part of a program called Bienvenido a Casa -- Welcome Home.
For many, it is like returning to a foreign land.
''I left very young,'' said Víctor Manuel Benítez, 37, who said he had lived in the United States for the past 22 years. He told authorities he worked in agriculture before sneaking across the U.S.-Mexico border as a teenager.
Benítez, who told authorities he served seven months in a Fort Worth penitentiary for drug possession -- a charge he denied -- said he hoped to return to field work.
''I'm glad to be in my country -- free,'' said Benítez, who has several tattoos, from tiny teardrops etched just below his right eye to two hands in prayer on his chest and a woman's name across his stomach. Tattoos are often signs of gang membership.
''Are those gang tattoos?,'' asked a police officer typing Benítez's information into a computer.
''No, I just like tattoos,'' Benítez said.
María Antonia Guevara, 40, another deportee on the unmarked white plane, said she had been caught by U.S. authorities in 2001, ignored an order to appear at a deportation hearing and then was caught again in Dallas in April as she tried to obtain a U.S. passport for her daughter.
This time, Guevara said, she was jailed and agreed to be deported.
''I didn't want to stay in jail,'' said Guevara, who is married to a U.S. citizen and left two daughters in Dallas. She also has a 15-year-old son in El Salvador.
''My plan now is for my husband to petition for me,'' she said, meaning he will file a request for a U.S. visa for her. ``God willing, in a year and a half, if the paperwork goes through, I'll be back with them.''
Back in La Hachadura, members of El Salvador's small and unarmed Patrulla Migratoria were on the lookout for smugglers' vehicles or gathering places for people heading out to illegally enter the United States. Salvadoran law makes it illegal to violate another nation's migration laws.
But the 2-year-old force of about 50 officers is more focused on watching out for minors heading north without the required parental consent. Many children get past them.
STOPPED IN MEXICO
José Javier Alfaro, 28, was intercepted in Mexico with his three nephews, aged 16, 14 and 12. They were trying to get to New York to join Alfaro's sister, who left six years ago.
''I'm living with my grandfather, but I wanted to be with my mother,'' said the eldest nephew, Jorge Alberto. ``I want to see her again.''
''We are searching for happiness,'' Alfaro said. ``This country is no good. You work hard and never get ahead. Over there, I know I could do better. I'm not going to steal. I'm going to work.''
Alfaro said he would not attempt the trip again with the boys but vowed to head north again alone as soon as he could.
''With the poverty here, you can't live,'' said Alfaro, who earns $3 a day in field work that barely supports a wife and two children. ``How am I supposed to live on that?''
Thompson, the U.S. Embassy spokeswoman, said the long-term solution to illegal migration lies in improving economic conditions in El Salvador.
''People have to start believing that their future is here, in El Salvador,'' she said. ``That they have opportunities here and that going illegally to the United States is not really the answer.''
Congress: Do the impossible....Do your job and follow the will of the people. The only devisive factor in this issue is YOU!
El Salvadorans: Stay Home!
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Exactly the thought I had when reading this.
El Salvadorans: Stay Home!
I would only add "...unless you come here legally as an immigrant".
Look to the example of Hong Kong or Singapore or Taiwan. Why can’t that country be just as prosperous?
We really need to enforce our immigration rules and patrol the border... but we also need to change the current rules to ensure that more folks with this kind of spirit are allowed in. Why not simply increase the visa quotas, handing them immigrant ID tracking numbers (with fingerprinting), and requiring anyone applying for public funds to be fingerprinted. No bennies to non-citizens. Taxes are saved, we get our "workers who will do the jobs Americans won't", and we get a steady infusion if this blessed work ethic.
Then we talk to Cuba's future leaders about out-sourcing our prison system for all non-citizens. $5,000/yr per inmate, for as long as they are verifiably still in those jails. Saves us $30,000/yr per inmate, serves as a huge deterrent, lowers Hispanic gang problems here, and sends gobs of cash to help rebuild Cuba and strengthen ties.
Bullshit, the sponsors will not be responsible for the ones coming in legally now, and the tax payers keep footing the bill.
We are awaiting these government's permission to return their citizens to them??????? Why?
Why not send them back as if they had merely traveled to America and are returning home (willingly) from a vacation?
A teardrop tattoo under the eye is a gang tattoo and indicates that you have killed someone. That’s what I heard, anyway.
‘’I’m glad to be in my country — free,’’ said Benítez, who has several tattoos, from tiny teardrops etched just below his right eye to two hands in prayer on his chest and a woman’s name across his stomach. Tattoos are often signs of gang membership.
‘’Are those gang tattoos?,’’ asked a police officer typing Benítez’s information into a computer.
‘’No, I just like tattoos,’’ Benítez said.
Just what we need to have immigrate to the US, a liar that only wants to commit the murders that Americans are too lazy to commit themselves. I’m surprised the author included the teardrop tats in this article.
I’ve been surfing El Salvador since during the civil war and after, and it was much safer during the war. That is one tough country these days. But it has of the most pristine surfing in all of Central America and a beautiful coast.
‘’I didn’t want to stay in jail,’’ said Guevara, who is married to a U.S. citizen and left two daughters in Dallas. She also has a 15-year-old son in El Salvador.
Ah yes, just the kind of family calues we need. Dropping kids everywhere and then just leaving them.
To a great extent the vast numbers of Salvadorans living in the United States has destroyed the sovereignty of that country. Salvadorans no longer have their own currency. The stable Colon has been tossed and now their only legal tender is the U.S. dollar. The huge U.S. Embassy is like Centro de Gobierno (the area of goverment offices) with Salvadorans lining up to do their business there.
Their are over 100,000 Salvadorans living in New York, over 100,000 living in Chicago, over 50,000 living in DC, and like number in New Orleans, Houston, LA, and SF.
The huge amount of dollars sent home eventually dwindles as 2nd generation Americans rise in the work force and so that part of the Salvadoran economy must refresh itself with another great exodus of citizens.
I love El Salvador but it like the USA has lost a sense of itself.
“...the most pristine surfing in all of Central America and a beautiful coast.”
Did you surf Zunsal? What spots are you at liberty to speak of?
All the spots are known now so I can tell you all of them. I've been going down there since the mid 1980s. I surf La Libertad (Punta Roca), Zunzal, and the points further up the road. Also the area known as the "Wild East" -- Punta Flores and Punta Mango. The Wild East is now built up for surf-tourist so it kind of sucks. We use to have it all to ourselves for years.
Speaking of Zunzal, I just found a picture on the Internet of GIANT Zunzal...
http://www.myrtlebeachseafoods.com/images_files/BIG%20ZUNZAL.jpg
Don’t ya love how the article keeps mention the US, and languishing in US detention centers, and the US working with Salvador govt....
THEY WERE CAUGHT IN, AND DEPORTED BY, MEXICO!
I wish Congress would realize the USA is not a dumping ground for the surplus populations of other countries - their perverts, criminals, and welfare cheats.
“When the children are that young, generally they are traveling with a relative or with a good coyote,’’ said Carlos Isaac Escalón Alvarez, immigration chief in La Hachadura, on El Salvador’s southwestern border with Guatemala”
Oh it’s alright then...
An increase of 99.9%!
Good news and a great start!
Now... about the corresponding Mexican number.... ?
Just asking.
ping
http://www.city-journal.org/html/eon2007-08-29sm.html
>>Both studies found that immigrants used government services at a greater rate than native-born residents did. The New Jersey study found, for instance, that the typical immigrant family received about $4,044 annually in government services, about 11 percent higher than the average native-born family. At the same time, immigrant households paid about 8 percent less in taxes. The net result was that “the average native household generated an annual fiscal surplus of $232” to government, while “the typical foreign household was a net burden of $1,484.” The gap was even wider in California, where immigrant households produced a net deficit of $3,463 each, because so much of that state’s recent immigration had been in the form of low-wage, low-skill workers.
Though the study did not distinguish between legal and illegal immigrants, it did break down foreign-born households by the regions of the world from which they had come. In both states, the study found the steepest deficit in Latin American households, which in New Jersey consumed 26 percent more in government expenditures than the average native-born family, but paid 38 percent less in taxes. By contrast, immigrant households in New Jersey that hailed from Europe or Canada actually consumed, on average, less in government services than the typical native-born family, and paid nearly as much in taxes. <<
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