Comment MEXICO CITY — When Mexico imposed visa requirements on Venezuelans in January, it briefly had the desired effect: The number of Venezuelans detained at the U.S.-Mexico border dropped. But it is now clear that it only pushed migrants onto more dangerous clandestine routes. Suddenly unable to simply fly to Mexico as tourists, but still desperate to leave their country, the Venezuelan migrants joined other migrants traveling overland through the dense, lawless jungle on the Colombia-Panama border. In 2021, when Venezuelans could still fly to Cancun or Mexico City as tourists, only 3,000 of them crossed the Darien Gap—a literal gap in the Pan-American Highway that stretches along 60 miles (97 kilometers) of mountains, rainforests and rivers. So far this year, there are 45,000, according to Panama’s National Immigration Service. “If they can’t get to the airports in Mexico, they get overland through Darien,” said Adam Isaacson of the Washington Office on Latin America. From there it’s just a series of stops: southern Mexico, the remote midpoint of the Mexico-US border, and then a final destination in the US, usually on the East Coast. Such visa requirements can stop some migrants — the pace of Brazilians and Ecuadorians slowed after Mexico imposed them last year — but not others, Isacson said. “It has to do with the level of desperation,” he said. Venezuela’s economy has collapsed due to a combination of mismanagement and US sanctions. The minimum wage for civil servants has dropped to the equivalent of $2 a month. Monthly salaries in the private sector average $75. Some of the Venezuelans arriving in the US now left Venezuela years ago, spent time in other countries, and are moving north now. In December, US Customs and Border Protection apprehended Venezuelans at the US-Mexico border nearly 25,000 times. Mexico imposed the visa requirement at the end of January and in February there were just 3,000 bookings. But that number began to rise again, slowly at first, and then sharply in June and July, when bookings topped 17,000. Information about the alternative route was passed between groups on platforms such as WhatsApp and through social media. Migrant smugglers who often infiltrate such groups affect the route, in this case a treacherous but established route of some 5,000 miles (8,000 km). Anderwis Gutiérrez, a 42-year-old construction worker, and his wife spent weeks watching online videos of the Darien crossing to judge whether they thought they could do it. When they finally decided, they joined a group of 110 immigrants of different nationalities. Only 75 of them came out of the jungle together. “They robbed us, they took our money, we endured four days without food,” he said. “One broke his leg, another was bitten by a snake, we had no medicine, we carried nothing.” He said they saw bodies, witnessed two rapes and, unable to hold back tears, said his wife nearly drowned when a swollen river carried her 100 meters downstream. “In the jungle nobody helps anybody.” Yonathan Ávila, a 34-year-old former soldier in the Venezuelan National Guard, traveled with his wife, their 3-year-old daughter and their 4-month-old baby. In total there were 14 relatives and friends. He believes his military training has helped him lead them without some of the tragedies that befall others. The city of Tapachula in southern Mexico, near the border with Guatemala, was the second bottleneck for those traveling by land. Since the Trump administration, Mexico has implemented a containment strategy intended to keep migrants confined to the south, away from the US border. Thousands seek asylum, but the process is long and there is little work in Tapachula. Frustrated migrants have pressured the government by repeatedly leaving the city en masse. As of June, Venezuelans are in the majority. The Mexican government began moving migrants to offices outside Tapachula or other states in October to speed up processing of temporary documents and to quell protests. Avila led one such march and obtained a transit permit that allowed his family to continue north. A foundation also helped because his baby was sick. Gutiérrez got a humanitarian visa. “To appease them, the National Institute of Immigration gives them cards,” Isacson said. Venezuelans and some other nationalities are also a problem for Mexico and the United States because they generally cannot be deported. After much negotiation, Mexico was recently able to send back more than 100. Once out of Tapachula, migrants quickly travel to the US border, usually buying bus tickets with money sent by relatives. According to WOLA’s analysis of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, 92 percent of Venezuelans crossed the U.S. border at two points in July: Yuma, Arizona, and Del Rio, Texas. Gutiérrez and Ávila crossed into Del Rio with their families. Both areas are “in the middle of nowhere,” Isacson said. “That tells us they are being guided there by someone, it can’t just be rumors circulating on WhatsApp.” Gutiérrez and Ávila arrived in the United States with their families. Gutiérrez was in Maryland, but without a job or a place to sleep, he and his wife planned to return to New York, where they had spent a few months in a homeless shelter. Ávila has a sales job in Boston, and a charity found them shelter and helped them get treatment for his child. Each week he must send a photo and his location to a cell phone given to him by US immigration authorities while he waits for his status to be processed. Meanwhile, he says his friends in Venezuela haven’t stopped asking him for advice on making their own trips to the U.S. “More are coming all the time.” AP writers Claudia Torrens in New York and Juan Zamorano in Panama City contributed to this report.
