Mexico has open arms for repatriated citizens coming back from the US. – PB/TK
As deportees return home, Mexico City warms up its welcome – By Whitney Eulich April 20 2017
On a recent Tuesday morning, scores of passengers disembarked from an unmarked plane and entered a back corner of Mexico City’s international airport through frosted glass doors.
There were no taxi drivers holding up placards with passenger names or loved ones grasping balloons or flowers to welcome them home, just two city employees. The women, whose big smiles contrast with many passengers’ tears, hawked fliers detailing financial support and job-training opportunities in the capital.
Since January, airplanes carrying between 130 and 135 Mexican deportees from the United States have arrived here three times a week. It’s an increase over the two flights a week that arrived starting in 2013, under former President Barack Obama, who some nicknamed “Deporter in Chief” for the record number of deportations that took place under his administration. Deportations from the US to Mexico fell during the first few months of President Trump’s term, compared to 2016. Given his promise of a border wall and his aggressive stance on immigrants and deportations, however, many here are girding for an uptick in repatriated citizens.
Mexico’s federal government has long been criticized for its lack of support for deportees, who either fly to the capital, often with their hands and feet bound, or are bused across the border into Mexico by the thousands each month. Many deportees experience discrimination once back in Mexico, where deportation has long been equated with violence or crimes committed in the United States.
Continue to csmonitor.com article: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/2017/0420/As-deportees-return-home-Mexico-City-warms-up-its-welcome
