Fears increase at crossing

BY LETTA TAYLER | Newsday Latin America Correspondent

May 16, 2006

For nine years, Asucena Balma has worried herself sick every time her husband sneaks across the border from the couple's home in Mexico, braving bandits, vigilantes and desert heat to reach his housecleaning job in Medford.

But her fears multiplied after President George W. Bush unveiled plans to send National Guard troops to the border.

"Suppose they shoot him?" fretted Balma, 32, in a telephone interview from the central Mexican town of Mixquiahuala. "There has to be some better solution."

Bush's plan has sent shock waves across Mexico, the homeland of more than half the estimated 12 million undocumented workers in the United States. Already, the proposal is worsening relations between the United States and its southern neighbor, a major trade partner and key regional ally.

"Troops are trained to kill, not to deal with civilians," said Eleazar Serrano Angeles, the mayor of Mixquiahuala, where many workers have left for jobs on Long Island. "This is no way to repay the valuable services that Mexicans perform in the United States."

Many Mexico experts also doubt a beefed-up border will stem illegal migration because even the lowest-paying jobs in the United States pay 10 times an average Mexican salary.

"It will only increase the deaths," said Arturo Solis, director of Mexico's Center for Frontier Studies and Human Rights.

Immigrants will take increasingly risky desert routes to avoid detection, he said. Last year, a record 473 immigrants died from causes such as heat and dehydration trying to cross the border. To reduce the risks, some undocumented workers may come home less often.

Balma's husband has returned four times in nine years. Her two daughters know their father mostly through photos.

"They still recognize their father," she said, "but for how long?"

By the numbers

37 million

People in the U.S. in 2005 were foreign-born. Of those ...

11.5 million

Are naturalized citizens

10.5 million

Are legal permanent residents

1.3 million

Have legal temporary status, such as students

11.1 million

Are illegal immigrants

SOURCE: PEW HISPANIC CENTER