Mexican federal and local police forces in Mexico City have been rounding up migrants and busing them to the southern part of the country in an attempt to alleviate the severe overcrowding. The severe overcrowding comes as the United States and Mexico have been unable to contain the growing number of migrants and asylum seekers trying to make their way north.
In recent days, Mexico’s National Migration Institute (INM), with the help of local police forces, began rounding up Central American and Caribbean migrants in Iztapalapa and other boroughs of Mexico City and shipping them off to the state of Tabasco. Police then released them into the streets without any belongings.
A high-ranking INM official who spoke with Breitbart Texas said the raids occurred at night to avoid drawing attention. INM agents told the migrants that they would take them to a shelter where they would get warm beds and food. The migrants would line up and get into several buses chartered by INM. However, instead of moving the migrants to a comfortable location, the buses would drive through the night in a southward direction towards various cities in the state of Tabasco, including Villa Hermosa.
Once there, the INM agents would drop off the migrants with no means of communication and, at times, without their belongings before returning to Mexico City.
The raids come as Mexico City has seen a dramatic rise in migrants. INM officials who asked not to be named estimated that more than 5,000 migrants have arrived in recent weeks, causing severe overcrowding in the various shelters throughout Mexico City. This has led to most of the migrants being forced to sleep on the streets in unsanitary conditions.
Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and senior Breitbart management. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at Iortiz@breitbart.com.
Brandon Darby is the managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart Texas’ Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and senior Breitbart management. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at bdarby@breitbart.com.