Portland Public Library

We built the wall, how the US keeps out asylum seekers from Mexico, Central America and beyond, Eileen Truax ; translated by Diane Stockwell

Label
We built the wall, how the US keeps out asylum seekers from Mexico, Central America and beyond, Eileen Truax ; translated by Diane Stockwell
Language
eng
Bibliography note
Includes bibliographical references
resource.biographical
contains biographical information
Index
no index present
Literary Form
non fiction
Main title
We built the wall
Nature of contents
bibliography
Oclc number
983821970
Responsibility statement
Eileen Truax ; translated by Diane Stockwell
Sub title
how the US keeps out asylum seekers from Mexico, Central America and beyond
Summary
From a storefront law office in the US border city of El Paso, Texas, one man set out to tear down the great wall of indifference raised between the US and Mexico. Carlos Spector has filed hundreds of political asylum cases on behalf of human rights defenders, journalists, and political dissidents. Though his legal activism has only inched the process forward -- 98 percent of refugees from Mexico are still denied asylum -- his myriad legal cases and the resultant media fallout has increasingly put US immigration policy, the corrupt state of Mexico, and the political basis of immigration, asylum, and deportation decisions on the spot. We Built the Wall is an immersive, engrossing look at the new front in the immigration wars. It follows the gripping stories of people like Saúl Reyes, forced to flee his home after a drug cartel murdered several members of his family, and Delmy Calderón, a forty-two-year-old woman leading an eight-woman hunger strike in an El Paso detention center. Truax tracks the heart-wrenching trials of refugees like Yamil, the husband and father who chose a prison cell over deportation to Mexico, and Rocio Hernández, a nineteen-year-old who spent nearly her entire life in Texas and is now forced to live in a city where narcotraffickers operate with absolute impunity
Table Of Contents
Introduction -- Part one. The border. The line between life and death -- Carlos Specter, attorney-at-law for impossible cases -- Constructing a border -- Part two. Exile and asylum. Annunciation house : the asylum tradition -- Political asylum : sheltering arms, but not for everyone -- Giving up freedom to save your life -- The business of locking up migrants -- Part three. Impunity. Preserving memory -- Impunity -- Seeking justice from the other side -- Part four. Here we are. Back to life -- The never-ending wave -- "We don't want you here!" -- Epilogue
resource.variantTitle
How the US keeps out asylum seekers from Mexico, Central America and beyond
Contributor
Content
Mapped to