Rape, Abuse, and Trauma at the US-Mexico Border
Introduction
The United States is known for many things; political controversy, military power, and ever-evolving relations with foreign powers, are a few key characteristics of what makes the United Sates so distinctive and notable. For many, the United States represents opportunity and the chance of breaking generational trauma and suffering for their family and themselves. The desire to improve ones life and the life of their family is a central driving force that inspires many to take the risk and attempt at crossing the US-Mexico border illegally. There are two different types of danger that come with participating in this journey: danger of receiving harm from natural forces and danger of receiving harm from other humans. In this paper, I will be discussing and analyzing the rape, abuse, and overall experiences Mexican immigrant women go through when crossing the border into the United Sates illegally and the long term effects that may result.
Demographic background and national context
To begin, it is important to note that 13% of the United States population is foreign-born born with approximately 27% of this population being undocumented (Garcini, Luz M et al.). These reported numbers are likely higher because it is incredibly hard to get a concrete number on just how many undocumented immigrants reside within the US and even harder to specify exactly how many are Mexican immigrants. With numbers of those illegally crossing at the border reportedly dropping, they also reveal a spike in the percentage of those crossing being women (Staudt, Kathleen, et al, 32). An estimated 20% of all migrants are reported to be women, which is higher than any previous published report has shown (Staudt, Kathleen, et al, 32). In having provided adequate context in just how many women are crossing the US-Mexico border, we can now fully grasp exactly how large of a scale the abuse that immigrant Mexican women face truly is.
Rape and Abuse in Exchange for Passage
It is commonly reported that women are especially vulnerable to experiencing acts of mistreatment by authorities, criminals, and sexual abuse and aggression in comparison to men. Some reports estimate that between 80%-90% of migrant women at Mexicos northern border have suffered sexual abuse (Staudt, Kathleen, et al, 31). Rape and sexual violence against women has become so prevalent that immigrants are becoming de-sensitized to it and some women even go as far as claiming they go into the journey considering rape as “the price you pay for crossing the border” (Staudt, Kathleen, et al, 32). A Mexican immigrant woman reported to a member of the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights in Oakland, Ca that many women in Mexico who are planning on attempting to cross the border have started taking birth control due to their expectation of getting assaulted on the journey to America (Falcón, 34). This report, in addition to many others that support this claim, suggests that these rapes and assaults on immigrant women are not random nor are they isolated and thus are a much bigger problem than officials claim. It is important to note that every victims perspective of any acts preformed against them whether it be rape, assault, or other types of interaction are up to their own discretion to define as they feel fit. What one may describe as assault another may disagree. The variance in peoples perception of what defines something as assault or rape, in addition to a lack of official data and reports, introduce the realization that the numbers of women who have faced/ are facing abuse is likely to be much more than the limited reports show.
Rape and Abuse at the hands of Border Agents and Related Officers
Over the past century, growing concern over the US-Mexico border has lead to an immense rise in support for militaristic tactics and strategies to be used in this region in effort to better manage and secure the border. There are two key elements that attribute to the militarization of Mexico’s northern border: integration of military troops in the border region and the “modification” of Border Patrol to appear as militant as possible via equipment, technology, and tactics used (Falcón, 32). With this expansion and investment in Border Patrol growing by the day, reports of abuse and assault at the hands of these officers and agents grow as well. What makes Militarized border rape distinct from other forms of militarized rape is that many women report that being raped by an agent was the price they would have to pay to avoid being turned into Border Patrol services and deported back to Mexico (Falcón, 34). Agent Larry Dean Selders raped Juanita Gomez in his patrol car after her and her cousin refused to have sex with him in exchange that he not take them to the border patrol station and deport them back to Mexico. The crime was reported to the proper police station and channels, but due to careless mishandling of evidence by the US authorities, he “received a 14-month sentence in the federal trial, but received credit for time served”. It is reported from three other women that Selders had assaulted them at some point and that the assault on Gomez was not his first offense (Falcón, 36). Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) Officer James Edward Riley was charged with "forcible rape with the use of a firearm, kidnapping and rape under the color of authority” after he abducted and raped a 24-year-old woman he met at a bar (Falcón, 37). It is reported that he told her she was going to be arrested for lacking proper legal documentation for being in the US before detaining her and bringing her back to his house where he then raped her and before releasing her (Falcón, 37). These stories are just two of an unrecorded many heinous cases of abuse and rape occurring at the hands of officers and agents at the US-Mexico border.
Long-term effects of Trauma and Physiological distress among Immigrant Women
Upon my research, I found a study that analyzed the association between trauma and physiological distress among undocumented Mexican immigrants on a scientific level. In “Deconstructing PTSD: Trauma and emotion among Mexican immigrant women”, an investigation into how subjective self-reporting of traumatic experiences by Mexican immigrant women in Chicago relates and connects with PTSD and other mental illnesses (Kimmell, Jacqueline et al.). The study consisted of Mexican women between the ages of 40 and 65 years old with 27% of them being undocumented and a vast majority of them living in a household where there was less than a $5,000 annual income (Kimmell, Jacqueline et al.). Reports from the study showed that 2/3 of the women in the experiment reported interpersonal abuse with half of these being related to health and immigration stress (Kimmell, Jacqueline et al.). The level of PTSD found within the subjects were abnormally high, with 38% of those meeting the higher criteria for PTSD (Kimmell, Jacqueline et al.). 50% of those in the study met any criteria for depression, leaving 46% of those in the study reporting neither depression nor PTSD (Kimmell, Jacqueline et al.). This study only scratches the surface of the true long term effects of trauma experienced by Mexican immigrant women as this report only discusses self-reported trauma and self-based analysis of the subjects symptoms and behavior.
