‘People will always come’: Inside a Haitian’s journey without end

The Biden administration’s treatment of Haitian migrants has outraged many of his supporters, including members of his government. The U.S. envoy to Haiti resigned in protest. A senior State Department official is also leaving his role, criticizing the continued use of Title 42, the Trump-era public health order authorizing the expulsion of thousands of would-be asylum seekers without hearing their claims.

While some Haitians were released into the United States to pursue asylum, thousands of others were expelled without a clear explanation. They were flown back to Haiti, the last place any of them wanted to be and the last place able to receive them. Fear of that same fate sent about 8,000 people back across the river to the Mexican border city, where government officials are also eager to see them gone.

Here, on the opposite shore of the international boundary, hundreds of confused, demoralized Haitians are still agonizing over what to do. Many are scattered throughout the city, hiding from Mexican police, who have rounded up scores of migrants and put them on buses back to the city of Tapachula, 1,500 miles south on the border with Guatemala.

Nicko was racked with doubt. Should he stay close to the Rio Grande by camping in a public park, vulnerable to police and criminals? Or be moved to an abandoned nightclub hastily converted to a shelter, by Mexican immigration officials he doesn’t trust?

It’s the latest in a series of wrenching decisions. Nicko was a teenager when the 2010 earthquake killed 220,000 and devastated his island nation. He pushed forward to university to study civil engineering, though his passion was always medicine. But when he graduated, there were no jobs. So he joined a massive exodus of Haitians who migrated to South America in search of opportunity.

He enjoyed his life in Chile, even if it was never easy. Their skin color makes Haitians targets for abuse by employers or landlords, migrants say. After five years of enduring racism and failing to obtain residency, he decided to leave. The global pandemic and a new U.S. administration gave him the final push. President Biden, Nicko said, seemed like a kind man who had promised to help.

So Nicko, carrying his faded university ID card as both proof of accomplishment and totem for his desired life, followed the advice of friends who had made the journey months before him. And he followed the signs — clothing wrapped on a tree, a rope strung across a swift waterway.