EL PASO, Texas — On the eve of President Joe Biden’s visit to the U.S.-Mexico border, hundreds of homeless immigrants slept on the ground outside a church shelter downtown, blocks away from the port of entry that Biden would tour in less than 24 hours.
Primarily young men from Honduras and Venezuela lingered outside Sacred Heart Church downtown as they waited in line for cold slices of Little Caesar’s pizza as others sat inside parked city buses as their cell phones charged on USB ports below seats. Others camped out among mounds of clothing and belongings that ran along the church’s red brick exterior walls.
INSIDE THE EL PASO CITY BLOCK WHERE EL PASO’S MIGRANT CRISIS OVERFLOWS INTO THE STREET
In a stark contrast of the crisis outside, inside the Catholic church, several dozen parishioners from the community sat in the wooden pews of the historic, whimsically painted sanctuary for Saturday evening mass at dusk.
Behind the sanctuary outside, dozens of men huddled in circles behind dumpsters in a poorly-lit alley.
Still, an air of excitement and anticipation filled the sidewalks. Several immigrants and volunteers on site said they were excited for Biden’s visit to town Sunday, and said he could visit the church — though the White House agenda did not indicate plans to do so.
While officials have tried to clear city sidewalks of makeshift homeless encampments ahead of Biden’s first presidential border visit, the immigration crisis is on full display in pockets of the city. The blocks surrounding the church have only fallen into worse condition over the last several weeks, as the city was unable to clear out people despite its many attempts leading up to Sunday.
A city spokeswoman and office of emergency management official did not respond to a request for comment about immigrants moved off the site in daily operations that began last Tuesday overnight and in the early morning — only for the same immigrants and new ones to return to the site by the afternoon.
Here’s a look at how historic illegal immigration levels have impacted four key areas of El Paso ahead of Biden’s Sunday trip.
Sacred Heart Church
Many immigrants on site have lived outside the church for days or weeks. One man from Honduras, who identified himself as Juan Francisco, volunteered to serve the donated food at one of the outside church tents on the corner of E. Father Rahm Avenue and Oregon Street. Juan said he arrived in El Paso on Dec. 24 and had not left town because he did not know where to go.
Through a Spanish interpreter volunteering with a church group on site, Juan explained that he had illegally crossed the border by crawling through a hole in a section of Obama-era border wall along Border Highway in El Paso.
Driving on the Border Highway that runs right along the El Paso / Mexico border pic.twitter.com/9rsVL6nv5S
— Anna Giaritelli (@Anna_Giaritelli) December 31, 2022
He evaded arrest and was essentially hiding in plain site from federal police, who could arrest him for being unlawfully present in the United States, because he did not have papers showing he had been released from custody.
Juan expressed a desire to work in the U.S., but said he could not go to Border Patrol and make an asylum claim for the persecution he said he had faced from gangs back home — because he would be expelled to Honduras under a pandemic policy.
That is why he and others have chosen to stay indefinitely outside the church.
It is busier and more packed on Saturday than the day after pandemic public health policy Title 42 was slated to end. The city expressed concern ahead of Title 42’s slated ending on Dec. 21 that the 2,250 immigrants arrested at the El Paso border in mid-December could soar even higher because border officials would lose authority to turn away immigrants like Juan, and face greater numbers of people released onto its streets.
The Supreme Court delayed Title 42’s termination, and that same week Republican Gov. Greg Abbott sent in 700 National Guard soldiers and more Department of Public Safety officers as a show of force on the river to deter would-be illegal immigrants. They installed barbed wire and shipping containers that helped funnel people to cross into downtown in one particular area where each person would be taken into custody and not evade police.
Both occurrences factored into why arrests of illegal immigrants at the border have dropped to fewer than 900 per day in the first week of January.
Nearly a dozen local cops walked onto the church block as darkness rolled in at 6 p.m. Saturday. Sidewalks that had been crowded cleared as some immigrants jumped over a short fence that ran along the church’s exterior. Others stopped mid-conversation to watch where the police were headed.
At a moment’s notice, should U.S. Border Patrol agents or El Paso police officers show up, immigrants sprint to the fence and jump over into mulch and plants. The sidewalk is not church property, but behind this short black fence, they cannot be arrested for immigration crimes on the basis that they are accessing a place of worship.
Border Patrol agents have come in at night this past week and asked those sleeping on site to provide the lawful presence papers they are given when released by Border Patrol.
A city employee who had been on site for “months” and spoke with police as they walked around the site told the Washington Examiner on the condition of anonymity that police told him they were on site to deter more problems caused by gang members in the community. The gang members have been known to attempt to recruit and force young men into that line of work, rob immigrants, and sell drugs.
Greyhound Bus Station
Less than half a mile from the church, the blocks surrounding the Greyhound Bus Station that had overflowed with immigrants less than three weeks ago sit empty. A handful of homeless El Pasoans sat on benches or sidewalks in two areas outside the station.
A body-length piece of cardboard that was likely used by immigrants as an insulating mat to sleep on the ground was caught in the chain link fence that surrounded the abandoned brick building where people had lived outside.
A massive pile of donated clothes on the streets had disappeared. The sleeping bags and hundreds of blankets were gone.
While El Paso residents celebrate the holidays four blocks away, immigrants with nowhere to go after being dropped onto the street by nonprofits are sleeping outside a Greyhound station due to bus shortages. The wind chill tonight is 30 degrees. Adults and children are out here. pic.twitter.com/DkJyO59AFB
— Anna Giaritelli (@Anna_Giaritelli) December 22, 2022
Portable toilets that were brought in for immigrants remained in a parking lot located across the street from the city’s convention center.
Inside the Greyhound station, it was business as usual — local residents, not immigrants, were seated in a waiting room that was previously filled with immigrants waiting for buses in December.
El Paso Convention Center
The block directly north of the bus station houses the convention center, which the city repurposed three times in three weeks in its rush to make space available indoors as overnight temperatures dropped below freezing the week before Christmas.
The city opened the convention center to immigrants who could provide papers from the Border Patrol that showed they had been released into the U.S. and given lawful presence to remain in the country through court proceedings.
The first few nights, officials reported just 200 of the 1,000 cots it had set up were occupied, as hundreds other immigrants continued to sleep outside the bus station and church. City and nonprofit organizations that have accepted federal reimbursement for expenses sheltering and feeding immigrants cannot admit people who do not have documents to be in the U.S.
El Paso is ready to start using the city’s convention center to start housing at least 1,000 migrants to alleviate the already-strained local shelters.
Officials say they are prepared to add additional cots, citing the potential end of the Title 42 expulsions this month. pic.twitter.com/DmikdyJjyt
— Camilo Montoya-Galvez (@camiloreports) December 21, 2022
The city did not allow the Washington Examiner to tour the convention center when it opened, nor did it respond to a request for comment about reports that it closed the convention shelter as migrant numbers decreased.
The overhaul of the convention center cost the city a beloved annual event when it canceled the Sun Bowl fan fiesta on Dec. 29, which was supposed to take place there.
Volunteers on site at the church said the convention center would no longer function as a shelter because the city had repurposed two nearby schools. A city official confirmed to media Saturday that the convention center site was shutting down.
As quickly as the convention center had been converted, it would be changed back.
El Paso International Airport
More than 100 immigrants lined the halls of a public section of the El Paso International Airport on Dec. 19.
On Jan. 7, the halls had been cleared. Art gallery rooms, where people had slept on the floors, stood empty.
Granted, it’s daytime and not late at night… I did not see immigrants camped out in the same area of the El Paso airport when I arrived this morning as I had on the evening of Dec 19 when more than 100 people were sleeping on the ground (next tweet will show the Dec 19 footage) pic.twitter.com/PmO3qNRSGW
— Anna Giaritelli (@Anna_Giaritelli) January 7, 2023
The city had moved immigrants out of the public area, and possibly into a private area of the airport, according to church volunteers working with migrants. The airport did not respond to a request for comment.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Although Biden will not pass through the airport upon his arrival, media in town for the presidential visit will leave the airport unable to see how immigrants slept on the floors in public view just weeks earlier.
