A 7-year-old Guatemalan girl died last week while in Border Patrol’s (CBP) custody. But a statement the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) released Thursday night about her death raises more questions than it answers.
The Washington Post reported that CBP told them the girl “died of dehydration and shock after she was taken into Border Patrol custody last week for crossing from Mexico into the United States illegally with her father and a large group of migrants along a remote span of New Mexico desert.”
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According to CBP, the girl was traveling with a group of 163 migrants and was in CBP custody for more than eight hours before she started having seizures. She was transported to a hospital in El Paso, where she died. CBP says she “reportedly had not eaten or consumed water for several days.”
The timeline raises questions about whether CBP provided the girl, identified by the Guatemalan foreign ministry as Jackeline Caal, with food or water during the hours she was in their custody. But instead of addressing that concern, DHS, which oversees CBP, initially released a statement about Caal’s death that appears to try to shift blame onto her and her father for making the trek to the US in the first place.
Here’s the whole statement:
Shortly after this story was published, DHS sent a statement to Vox saying that after Caal and her father were detained, they were taken to a facility “where water was available.”
Here’s that statement in its entirety.
While DHS urges asylum seekers to present themselves at ports of entry, Vox’s Dara Lind recently detailed how the Trump administration has made them wait for lengthy, indeterminate periods of time in Mexico before considering their claims. That practice creates an incentive for people like Caal and her father to take matters into their own hands.
During an interview on Friday’s edition of Fox & Friends, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen also avoided addressing concerns about how CBP treated the girl, but instead characterized her death as “just a very sad example of the dangers of this journey.”
But Caal didn’t die on the journey to America. She died after making the journey, while in Border Patrol’s custody.
Aura Bogado, an immigration reporter with Reveal, detailed conditions in hieleras — the facilities CBO uses to detain border crossers.
Caal’s death comes months after a toddler died from an illness she developed at an Immigration and Border Customs Enforcement facility in Dilley, Texas.
In a statement provided to CNN, Cynthia Pompa, an advocacy manager for the American Civil Liberties Union’s Border Rights Center, said Caal’s death “represents the worst possible outcome when people, including children, are held in inhumane conditions.”
“Lack of accountability, and a culture of cruelty within CBP have exacerbated policies that lead to migrant deaths. In 2017, migrant deaths increased even as the number of border crossings dramatically decreased,” Pompa added.
It’s perhaps one of many things House Democrats will be investigating when they take control of the chamber in January.
Sourse: vox.com
