Amnesty International held a news conference and protest in San Diego Tuesday to release its latest report regarding the federal government's treatment of humanitarian aid workers at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The news conference took place at the San Ysidro Port of Entry and a protest was held in front of the Federal Court Building.
The human rights organization's new report is titled "Saving Lives Is Not a Crime: Politically Motivated Legal Harassment of Migrant Human Rights Defenders by the USA." The report details the federal government's human rights violations against human rights defenders at the border.
Human rights lawyer Erika Pinheiro, who works for the organization Al Otro Lado, was placed on a government watchlist, which set off an international "migratory alert" and prevented her from being able to enter Mexico. She said that separated her from her family and impacted her work.
"I had to spend about a month outside of Mexico while I tried to get another Visa to come back," she said. "I was separated from my child who remained in Mexico. And when I finally was issued a visa and able to come back to Mexico I was detained again, interrogated. And my understanding from my attorneys in Mexico is that I will be interrogated anytime I come into contact with an immigration agent. And it remains unclear whether I would be detained and deported from any other country that I wish to enter."
The afternoon protest at the Federal Court Building called on U.S. authorities to stop "targeting human rights defenders at the border, endangering migrants, and asylum seekers in the process."
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Amnesty International's report found that the U.S. government has "conducted an unlawful and politically motivated campaign of intimidation, threats, harassment, and criminal investigations against people who defend the human rights of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers ... on the U.S.-Mexico border."
On Monday, the news outlet ProPublica also published a report on a secret Facebook group where Border Patrol Agents posted racist and defamatory messages about migrants, human rights advocates, and members of Congress. This didn’t surprise Jenn Budd, who was a border patrol agent from 1995 to 2001.
"This is nothing new for the United States Border Patrol," she said. "This needs to be investigated, the Border Patrol has not been held accountable, the agents are the ones who do the hiring, the agents are the ones who do the training, the agents are the ones who do the firing. That is how come it stays so tight."
The release of the Amnesty International report coincides with Tucson prosecutors' announcement Tuesday that they will prosecute Arizona State University's Dr. Scott Warren for a second time for harboring an undocumented immigrant. Warren was volunteering with the humanitarian group No More Deaths when he was arrested by U.S. Border Patrol in Ajo, Arizona, on suspicion of concealing, harboring or shielding two undocumented immigrants in January 2018. Today's court appearance followed a mistrial on June 11 when two thirds of jurors sought to acquit him.
