Brut visited the U.S.-Mexico border to see how migrants seeking asylum live. YouTuber Slim Albaher explains the desperate ongoing situation.
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00:00Hi I'm Slim Albehar and today I'm with Brew. Do you remember this picture?
00:07A man and his daughter died right in this area. They were found face down, a man and his child,
00:15right at this river. The father was named Oscar. He was 25 years old. His daughter,
00:22Angie Valeria, was 23 months old. The two were seeking asylum from El Salvador when
00:27they drowned in the Rio Grande. This horrific picture has shocked the world,
00:31showing a vivid and devastating picture of the immigration crisis.
00:35They got tired of waiting. They just waited too long. They want to be right there and it looks
00:39very close but it's very dangerous, extremely dangerous. With Brew, we wanted to understand
00:46the story behind this picture. So we traveled to the southern border and visited the migrant
00:50camp of Matamoros, the Mexican city just across from Brownsville, Texas. This is where Oscar
00:57and Angie Valeria spent some of their final days. Most asylum seekers here come from Central
01:10America, among them tens of thousands of children who've been affected by President Trump's
01:16zero-tolerance policy on immigration. Last month, 20,000 migrant children were illegally brought
01:22into the United States, a dramatic increase. These children are used as human pawns by vicious
01:30coyotes and ruthless gangs. Matamoros has become a forced shelter for migrants. Over a thousand
01:39refugees, including around 300 children, live in a tent encampment. Many said they live here
01:45without sufficient food or even drinking water.
01:58They're going to come through. We're going to give them a burrito. We'll give them a granola bar
02:03and we'll give them a cookie. If these families are holding up, it's in part thanks to the help
02:08of American volunteers who every day cross the border to supply them with food, water,
02:13and a reason to have hope. It's a very sad situation, and to see children suffer,
02:21to see children eating on concrete floors, it breaks my heart. I went to war. I was willing
02:27to give my life for America, and what I see America is doing now is just tearing me apart
02:33emotionally, spiritually. This is not the America that I fought for.
02:43My family, there are five of us. Three boys and a little boy, and me.
02:48What I do is I throw my little bag of chicken inside and I stay here in the sun.
03:13What I do is I try to avoid it and I ask those who help me and give me strength.
03:17Because sometimes, you know, sometimes you do it a little better for our children.
03:24Well, I don't know. What are they going to do with us?
03:28♪♪♪
03:58Thousands of asylum seekers end up stranded here for months,
04:11and this is the result of a metering system. That system limits the number who can apply
04:15for asylum each day, but they're also affected by the Migrant Protection Protocols, better known as
04:21the Remain in Mexico Policy, that forces migrants to wait across on the side while their asylum
04:27claims a process.
04:36Yeah, we've got family down here. They're using the river water to actually wash their clothing.
04:42Now, one thing that they need to understand is that the minute that they enter into that area,
05:02they have the right to be processed for asylum. That is U.S. soil. So you can see the temptation.
05:09I'm a strong swimmer. I would not attempt that. This was about two weeks ago. A gentleman was
05:14showering down in the river. He was cleaning himself and he drowned. That undertook very,
05:20very dangerous. The Matamoros Refugee Camp exemplifies all the Trump's administration
05:27strategies to keep migrants from gaining entry into the U.S., including the separation of
05:32children. More than 5,400 children were separated from their families since July 2017. Thousands of
05:38children have been held in the U.S. Border Patrol facilities across the country. We met a lawyer who
05:43was able to enter a facility. My name is Karla Vargas. I am a senior attorney with the Texas
05:49Civil Rights Project here in Alamo, Texas. Migrants were calling this facility the perrera,
06:05or dog cage. The government made no differentiation between housing an adult in a facility like this
06:15and under these conditions, and a child. There was one 16-year-old child who died
06:21in the Westlake facility after falling ill. His name was Carlos Gregorio Hernandez Vasquez. He was
06:2816. They keep them in a building like this incommunicado, so they have absolutely no access
06:43to lawyers, no access to family, no access to anybody other than potentially their consulate.
06:49I saw children, I saw infants that were detained in this facility. The lights are on all the time.
06:56Migrants also call these places hieleras, or ice boxes, and it's because they're kept at absolutely
07:02frigid temperatures, especially for children. Any crisis that's happening here at the border,
07:07I want to be very clear, this was a crisis that was implemented and fomented by our government.
07:17In Brownsville, Texas, not everyone is against Trump's immigration agenda.
07:21In this city, only five minutes away from the border, the president has loyal supporters.
07:28Some agree to talk to us at the city's shooting range.
07:41I think Trump is doing the right thing, trying to make it
07:46so we don't get flooded by illegals. The parents want the United States to come out with a kid
07:51in their arms, and it's a lot easier to gain citizenship if you have a child with you,
07:57a lot easier. I think that's terrible. And right now, they're doing DNA testing on those
08:03children and the adults, both. They're not related. They're being deported.
08:09However, the problem is the kids are here now. What do you do with the kids?
08:16The children are in a far worse position than the adults, yet they still bring them over as
08:29if they're just items. You have three-year-olds, two-year-olds, even babies coming over the border.
08:35Next thing you know, you see them floating in the river, all because some parent paid
08:39human traffickers some money. That's it. Come here legally, sign the paperwork,
08:44do the paperwork, pay the fees, fines, everything like that, and come here legally. That's fine by
08:47me. But if you're coming over here expecting a handout, you come over here and you expect
08:52something for free? I don't think so. Donald Trump is already making immigration
09:01the centerpiece of his 2020 re-election bid. And if his first campaign event proved anything,
09:06it's that his message has changed little since 2016.
09:08Every single Democrat candidate for president
09:11raised their hand in favor of giving free health care to all illegal aliens.
09:21They want to give more to illegal aliens than they give to American citizens. You see that?
09:29As president, I will never allow the Democrats to take away your health care dollars and give them
09:35to people that are in our country illegally. Thank you.
09:41This message continues to rouse his supporters, but other Americans aren't afraid to speak out against it.
09:47We can't change the president. We can just put band-aids on the damage he's done
10:05until he's gone, until he's just nothing but a horrible chapter in the history books of America.
10:11It made me very angry. It made me want to have to do something. It made me want to use my voice.
10:16I needed to, just for myself, remember what kind of caused this in me. So I did create,
10:25I had an artist replicate these tattoos. Now, one of them is for Alonso, and the other one is for
10:30Jessica. Jessica, she died. She died. She was ill. Her parents were in another detention facility.
10:36She was devastated, refused to eat, and she died. Felipe, also, he was dehydrated. He was very ill.
10:42He was separated from his parents. He didn't get the medical treatment that he needed,
10:46and he died. These are victims of a failed policy. Separating children from families is
10:51just the most horrid thing that I've ever experienced in my life. It's things that
10:55I never thought that America would ever resort to, but we're here. We're living it. We're seeing it.
11:00Every day when I cross the bridge, I see victims of a racist policy. I see kids that are ill,
11:06kids that need help.