US Border Patrol routinely sabotages provisions left for migrants

A report by humanitarian groups claims US border patrol has an interesting method for discouraging Mexican border-crossers: Sabotaging provisions left for them so that they die in the desert.

United States border patrol agents routinely vandalise containers of water and other supplies left in the Arizona desert for migrants, condemning people to die of thirst in baking temperatures, according to two humanitarian groups.

In a report published on Wednesday, the Tucson-based groups said the agents committed the alleged sabotage with impunity in an attempt to deter and punish people who illegally cross from Mexico.

Volunteers found water gallons vandalised 415 times, on average twice a week, in an 800 sq mile patch of Sonoran desert south-west of Tucson, from March 2012 to December 2015, the report said. The damage affected 3,586 gallons.

The report also accused border patrol agents of vandalising food and blankets and harassing volunteers in the field.

[…]

The report, published by No More Deaths and La Coalición de Derechos Humanos, said wildlife – as well as hunters, hikers and border militia members – also damaged aid drops. But it said the main culprits were agents from border patrol, a branch of Customs and Border Protection, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security.

“The practice of destruction of and interference with aid is not the deviant behavior of a few rogue border patrol agents, it is a systemic feature of enforcement practices in the borderlands.”

It’s amazing how cruelly the government will treat people whom it clearly doesn’t view as full-fledged human beings. Meanwhile, before you start screaming Trump’s name, the bulk of the report’s finding were observed during President Obama’s tenure. And even with Trump’s openly xenophobic rhetoric, his deportation numbers still come in second to his predecessor’s, who retains his title of Deporter-in-Chief.

(via @radleybalko)