âHow many days have you gone without food?â she asks into the phone.
Tani, her younger sister, is heard sobbing. âHelp me,â she gets out.
Cruz Caceres assures her: âI am going to pay today. Iâll make another deposit.â
The April 1 call ends abruptly, and Cruz Caceres stops recording.
A week before the recording, Cruz Caceres, a single mother from Honduras who won asylum in Tennessee, had gotten another call that upended her already precarious life: Kidnappers in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, had abducted her pregnant sister Tani and Taniâs 4-year-old son, and they wanted more than $20,000, according to a video recording of the call and messages reviewed by the Los Angeles Times. The family asked The Times not to use her sisterâs last name, for fear of retribution from the kidnappers in Mexico and gangs back home.
WASHINGTON (Tribune News Service) With shaking hands, Karen Cruz Caceres manages to hit record on the call. “How many days have you gone without food?” she asks into the phone. Tani, her younger sister, is heard sobbing. “Help me,” she gets out. Cruz Caceres assures her: “I am going to pay today. I’ll make another deposit.” The April 1 call ends abruptly, and Cruz Caceres stops recording. A week before the recording, Cruz Caceres, a single mother from Honduras who won asylum in Tennessee, had gotten another call that upended her already precarious life: Kidnappers in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, had abducted her pregnant sister Tani and Tani’s 4-year-old son, and they wanted more than $20,000, according to a video recording of the call and messages reviewed by the Los Angeles Times. The family asked The Times not to use her sister’s last name, for fear of retribution from the kidnappers in Mexico and gangs back home.
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President Biden promised to bring “human dignity” to the U.S. immigration system. But his administration’s continued use of a Trump-era policy has cast doubt on that stated goal.
Back in March 2020, Trump invoked Title 42, an obscure public health statute from 1944 that allows the president to deny entry into the United States to foreign nationals who might spread a communicable disease. The start of the COVID-19 pandemic gave Trump an excuse to shut down the border and have immigrants caught trying to enter the U.S. without authorization expelled quickly into Mexico. The Biden administration has kept that immigration enforcement tool in place in an effort to stem criticism from political opponents who see a growing crisis at the border.
âHow many days have you gone without food?â she asks into the phone.
Tani, her younger sister, is heard sobbing. âHelp me,â she gets out.
Cruz Caceres assures her: âI am going to pay today. Iâll make another deposit.â
The April 1 call ends abruptly, and Cruz Caceres stops recording.
A week before the recording, Cruz Caceres, a single mother from Honduras who won asylum in Tennessee, had gotten another call that upended her already precarious life: Kidnappers in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, had abducted her pregnant sister Tani and Taniâs 4-year-old son, and they wanted more than $20,000, according to a video recording of the call and messages reviewed by the Los Angeles Times. The family asked The Times not to use her sisterâs last name, for fear of retribution from the kidnappers in Mexico and gangs back home.