Rachel Schmidtke is the senior advocate for Latin America at Refugees International. Previously, she was the Deputy Protection Coordinator for the ICRC and program associate at the Mexico Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars where she played a key role in the development of the Mexico Institute’s migration portfolio.
Publications by the Author
The United States is deporting thousands of third country nationals to Mexico using coercive tactics, including enforced disappearances.
We spoke with migrants and asylum seekers stranded in Villahermosa, Mexico.
Estados Unidos está abandonando una respuesta a la crisis en nuestro propio hemisferio y deshaciendo casi una década de progreso.
The U.S. is abandoning a crisis response in our own hemisphere and undoing nearly a decade of progress.
This agreement outsources the Trump administration’s cruel immigration enforcement to other countries and is a misuse of U.S. funding.
The decision should serve as a warning to the Costa Rican government not to collaborate with the United States on deportation deals that will violate the human rights of migrants.
El gobierno de Costa Rica participó voluntariamente en una serie de violaciones de derechos humanos contra personas migrantes expulsadas por Washington.
In just four months, the Trump administration has dismantled this protection infrastructure and pressured Costa Rica into violating the rights of refugees – while simultaneously increasing the migration pressures.
Instead of protecting people seeking asylum, U.S. officials whisked them away in an attempt to place them beyond U.S. law and courts.
With the U.S. posturing as a regional bully, countries across the region must work together to share responsibility and protect and support people seeking safety.