A San Antonio refugee aid group said at least four of the people detained in Tuesday night’s trailer incident have been removed from the U.S. The Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services says it is learning more about the migrants from their relatives.
Fifty-four people were found inside the trailer Tuesday night. According to RAICES, several have already been deported.
Jenny Hixon, RAICES director of education and outreach, said one woman from Mexico was attempting to join her child in North Texas.
“We know that one of the people that was deported was reuniting with her school age daughter in Dallas and that was the whole purpose of why she was coming back was to be back with her very small child,” she said.
Hixson, who was at the scene Tuesday, said RAICES attorneys were not permitted to speak with the migrants.
“They never told us that we weren’t allowed to speak to the folks in the trailer, they just kept putting us off until they were loaded on VIA busses and driven away,” she said.
She said the immigration system is complex and migrants might not know their rights without speaking to attorney.
“We were there very quickly,” she said. “There was plenty of time for us to be able to speak to them. It could have been something as simple as one our attorneys go on those busses and doing a very quick group orientation about ‘these are your basic rights in this system.’”
When Homeland Security Investigations and Immigration and Customs Enforcement was asked Thursday if anyone from the incident had been deported, a spokeswoman said the situation is still fluid and there were no updates.
Joey Palacios can be reached at Joey@TPR.org and on Twitter at @Joeycules
