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A group of migrants hangs out and watches TV at "Casa del Migrante Frontera Digna" created by priest Jose Guadalupe Valdes Alvarado. "Casa del Migrante Frontera Digna" was created to provide lodging for migrants from different countries who arrive a

Migration Crisis at the US/Mexico Border • Luján Agusti

(Collaboration with Tamara Merino, text by Alice Driver)

In these photos, Tamara Merino and Luján Agusti capture how the migration crisis impacts daily life on both sides of the US-Mexico border. In one portrait, a single father from Honduras holds his two-year-old son while standing on the international bridge in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. He explains that he hopes to request asylum in the US, his body erect, his eyes shining with tenderness and worry. In another, a father and son sit on a bed at a migrant shelter in Piedras Negras, Mexico. The priest who runs the shelter is worried that the two will be separated at the border when they request asylum. At a domestic violence shelter in Laredo, Texas, a young undocumented woman discusses how the father of her child, who beat her, threatened to have her deported without her children. The sheriff in Eagle Pass, Texas talks about how he works to uphold the law, but he also recognizes that immigrants do a lot of work in his community, everything from building houses to caring for children. Each of these relationships and moments reflects the complexity of the border and the lives and relationships that are intertwined on both sides. 

The migrants who have made it to the international bridge in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, several whom have traveled from as far away as Venezuela, are caught in limbo. They sleep on the bridge for days, waiting for officials on the US side to process their requests for asylum. They are caught between Mexico and the US, their fate held up by constantly changing immigration policies in the US. They don’t know if a wall will be built, if they will be separated from their children when they cross the border, if they will spend months or years in detention. But they hold out hope for a better future.

 

PROJECTS

Migration Crisis at the US/Mexico Border

Collaboration By Luján Agusti and Tamara Merino; text by Alice Driver

In these photos, Tamara Merino and Luján Agusti capture how the migration crisis impacts daily life on both sides of the US-Mexico border. In one portrait, a single father from Honduras holds his two-year-old son while standing on the international bridge in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. He explains that he hopes to request asylum in the US, his body erect, his eyes shining with tenderness and worry. In another, a father and son sit on a bed at a migrant shelter in Piedras Negras, Mexico. The priest who runs the shelter is worried that the two will be separated at the border when they request asylum. At a domestic violence shelter in Laredo, Texas, a young undocumented woman discusses how the father of her child, who beat her, threatened to have her deported without her children. The sheriff in Eagle Pass, Texas talks about how he works to uphold the law, but he also recognizes that immigrants do a lot of work in his community, everything from building houses to caring for children. Each of these relationships and moments reflects the complexity of the border and the lives and relationships that are intertwined on both sides. 

The migrants who have made it to the international bridge in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, several whom have traveled from as far away as Venezuela, are caught in limbo. They sleep on the bridge for days, waiting for officials on the US side to process their requests for asylum. They are caught between Mexico and the US, their fate held up by constantly changing immigration policies in the US. They don’t know if a wall will be built, if they will be separated from their children when they cross the border, if they will spend months or years in detention. But they hold out hope for a better future.