A mother’s choice: Jail in L.A. or deportation to Mexico with her children

Yojuela, Mexico – Modesta Matías Aquino worked at the Glass House Farms in Camarillo, in the regular morning shift – up to 3 noon – over 3 noon.

Among his colleagues on the morning of July 10 were two of his daughter, 16 and 19 years old.

Matías remembered that as everything continued, there were rumors that there could be something bad with raids, ”Matías remembered.

Around 9 am, he said that the masked agents in tactical vests closed the expanding compound. Matías and his daughters were among the US officials more than 300 undocumented immigrants, who were detained at a pair of glass households.

Like other operations in the United States, the raids divided many “mixed status” families, especially US-born citizens-often children-of their children-undocumented relatives, and many “mixed status” families with one or both of them.

Matías’s family life is complex, including any definition, including seven daughters. The two smallest daughters of 2 and 5 years old are US citizens born in California. 2-year-old grandson-Matías’s 16-year-old daughter’s child-is a local California. When Matías was held in a federal lock in the city center of Los Angeles, he faced a very important choice – he will mark his family for life.

43 -year -old Matías can agree to lift it to Mexico. However, this may effectively prohibit the return to the United States, where most of the last quarter century, as a field worker and have deep family ties.

Alternatively, it can fight for deportation in court. But that would probably leave him indefinitely detained.

“They told me that I could locked for months, maybe a year and they never saw my children, Mat Matías said, recalling what US agents informed in Los Angeles. “I couldn’t stand it.”

Instead, Matías voluntarily agreed to return to Mexico, but with a warning: he should accompany the two smallest daughters and grandchildren. After some bargaining – Federal officials initially prevented the disregard of citizens to Mexico, Matías – an agreement was reached. (The Ministry of Internal Security did not answer questions from The Times.)

He and his four daughters – Glass House and two young people working in two young people who work in young people – were soon in a minibus to Tijuana. His grandson, who was born in the USA, was with them.

Düş Continue, dedi he said, after allowing an agent Matías to go on the border. “Now you have returned to your country.”

Back to Yojuela

The Yojuela move is home to 500 people living in the depths of Sierra Madre Oriental in Southern Oaxaca, Mexico – all local zapotec origins – all domestic zapotec origins. The region is known for its clay pot, fired from the distinctive reddish world, and for something else, sending the lines to work in the California fields, supporting their beloved ones at a time-tested parade.

The Scripted sequel is the return of those who are ongoing but never abandoned their roots. However, these days, many of them returned to places like Yojuela, and the losses of President Trump’s deportation attack were broken and canceled.

Matías and his family appeared last month, just 20 days after being detained. Seven years ago he had set foot last.

Matías said, with both resignation and pride, putting visitors into a green patch that shone after the last rains and said, “I was born and raised.”

Reaching the quarry of the ancestors, a two-hour driving on the way to a washing board from the nearest city, a driving uphill and then a short hike-a stream and a steep hill, as the corn and beans and pine stands pass, to a film music of turkey and broing donkeys.

The accompanying Matías was the US -born two daughters, Arisbeth, 2 and 5 years old in Tijuana, Keilani, an Oxnard preschool. In addition, Matías’s 16 -year -old daughter Liam Yair, who was born in Ailed and Ailed’s USA, had 2.

It was marked that the local California had met with wide families for the first time, including a team of curious cousins.

Periodic re -merger ritual, Matías’s mother, Cecilia Aquino, and five brothers all walking to California. For decades, the Adobe residence has hosted the sons and daughters back and forth and hosted the grandchildren waves and entrusted the expanding incubators Matriarza.

Matías and his mother, now 72, embraced, no need for a word. Each one examined the other closely. Time had received the melancholic fee.

“All my children had to go away and leave their children with me-there is no job here, Aqu said Aquino was worn for years while preparing coffee in a racked stove. “Then they come back. Then they go again. Sadly. Children never recognize their parents. I wish the authorities on the other side [of the border] He would allow them to be together. “

Leave the house

Matías joined the immigrant trail after the harvests from California to the Northwest Pacific – strawberry, celery, broccoli and more. Over the years, he gave birth to seven daughters – four in the United States, three in Mexico – because he crossed the border dozen times.

Matías said, “I was always a single mother, I was always fighting on my own for my children,” Matías said. “I won everything with my own sweat and trouble. The fathers of my children never gave me anything.”

As the international border once became a militarized infection, the last journey in the north in 2018 was the most difficult. He promised to have the last transition. Four years ago, Glass House, an important player in the legalized cannabis explosion, said that he provided work at Farms.

“It was the best thing I have ever had,” he said.

There was no tendency to break back: the trimmers sat on the benches. The Kamar Sun was not a problem in temperature -controlled facilities.

Matías said he had risen to become a crew’s supervisor who controls 240 workers. He said he earned more than $ 20 per hour and regularly exceeded $ 1,000 per week with overtime – in Oaxaca, the field hands of his hands about $ 10 a day in his pocket.

He said that his plan would stay in California until he was 65, and then he would retire to Yojuela using savings to open a shop.

“I never wanted to stay forever in Oxnard,” he said.

Then July 10 came.

‘Total chaos’

“People were running everywhere,” Matías remembered the raid. “Some tried to hide in the greenhouses. Others crawled in the ventilation shafts.

When a worker, 56 -year -old Jaime Alanis García fell off the roof of a greenhouse, he died of injuries while trying to escape the arrest.

Matías, who prevented any escape for himself and his two daughters, Los Militars – He fought and heavily armed US agents.

That evening, Matías said he had a detained night in the city center of Los Angeles. The next day he accepted a “voluntary turn” to Mexico.

For almost a week, the family stayed in a shelter in Tijuana and was waiting for the arrival of his male partner and his 19 -year -old daughter’s boyfriend. Both were among the Glass House prisoners. The three -day bus journey included a change of crazy, Crosstown terminals in Mexico City at midnight to capture Oaxaca’s last coach.

With his remaining savings, Matías bought an unfinished, ashes at the foot of Miahuatlán de Porfirio Díaz, a historical but boring city that hosts a federal prison. On a rude runway from Yojuela, it offers basic training and expectations about a two -hour driving.

The deportation of Mexico shattered a family that reached the modicum of stability in California – perhaps an illusion.

Modesta Matías Aquino’s 5 -year -old Keilanzo Lorenzo Matías, a US -born daughter of the US, is in the family’s new home in Miahuatlán de Porfirio Díaz.

(For Liliana Nieto del Rio / The Times)

Like his mother, 16 -year -old Lorenzo Matías succumbed to the siren call of the border. He was 14 years old when he and his boyfriend went to California. He struggled to climb the fences and descend by the US side and worried about his baby. He was five months pregnant.

The other day, Aileed sat in the stairwell of the new house in Miahuatlán and hugged his son. They also shared a video call to Oxnard with the father of the child working at the Glass House. However, with a fate, he was out of office on 10 July.

Orum I want to go back to California, dedi he said softly talked about harassment. “My son was born there. And here Pope like that. ”

Contrary to the attack, his sister Natalia Lorenzo Matías, 19, has no intention of returning.

“No, I don’t want to go back, Nat Natalia said. “There is no real life there. You are working and locking your time in your home, fearing that you will always be arrested.”

His mother was tortured, but he tries to hide his despair. Im I must be strong for children, Mat Matías said. “I start crying when I’m alone.”

Trump says he understands his purpose: he wants to deport criminals. However, why do hardworking immigrants aim?

“All of my years in the north,” he said, “I haven’t seen any American working in the fields.”

He says that his plan is to stabilize the family, to save his 5 -year -old child in school, to find some jobs, and perhaps he is once again departing in a year or two.

For now, Matías says he focuses on helping his family adapt to a new lifestyle – though, hoping to be a temporary one, until he returns to California.

Special reporters Cacilia Sánchez Vidal and Liliana Nieto Del Río contributed.