Luis Gutierrez

National Guard and Mexican Army troops arrived with caterpillars and tow trucks at 4 am.

After several attempts by Tijuana’s municipal government, to evict campers at El Chaparral PedWest port of entry, it happened. 385 migrants from Central American countries and some Mexican nationals woke up at dawn on February 6 to see local authorities clear away what they regarded as their homes.

Despite the promise of Tijuana’s mayor not to use the public force, he did. Riot police, National Guard and Mexican Army troops arrived with Caterpillar tractors and tow trucks at 4 am.

Inhabitants were warned a couple of hours before to gather their belongings. Jose Munguia from Michoacan, who lived there for eight months with his wife and two children, pointed out that the government will send them to a shelter where they would be able to stay for three days. “After those three days, what? Where we’ll go? I don’t have an idea what to do but wait and see if the U.S. government gives us the refugee status; we can’t go back to Michoacan due to the dangerous situation there.”

"The police just gave us 15 minutes to take our things up.”

Luis Gutierrez

Miguel Aguilar, a migrant from Honduras, said it was unfair how sudden this eviction happened. “All the stuff we got here (an improvised kitchen) was not given by the government. All this comes from people of good hearts on the other side of the border. They will trash everything; the police just gave us 15 minutes to take our things up.”

"We can’t go back to Michoacan."

Luis Gutierrez

The municipal secretary of social welfare, Gerardo Lopez, said many tents were empty, and some migrants were taking advantage of this situation to get free food or donations. According to him and Tijuana’s Mayor Monserrat Caballero, the eviction will help the 165 children that were living there.

At 2 pm that day, the square was totally clear.

Luis Gutierrez

The mayor emphasized that this was not an outcome of binational pressure to reopen the PedWest Port of entry. (El Chaparral was the only entrance to the U.S. that was not working after the withdrawal of the Covid travel restrictions.)

Tijuana’s government announced that the relocation of these people was arranged with three of the biggest migrant shelters in town.

The eviction met no open resistance from inhabitants. At 2 pm that day, the square where these 385 people lived was totally clear, and the local government was looking towards the re-opening of the PedWest Port of Entry to the U.S.