Migrant camp tents across border from Texas are set ablaze

MATAMOROS, Mexico — About two dozen makeshift tents were set ablaze and destroyed at a migrant camp across the border from Texas last week, witnesses said Friday, a sign of the extreme risk that comes with being stuck in Mexico as the Biden administration increasingly relies on that country to host people fleeing poverty and violence.

The fires were set Wednesday and Thursday at the sprawling camp of about 2,000 people — most of them from Venezuela, Haiti and Mexico — in Matamoros, a city near Brownsville, Texas. An advocate for migrants said they had been doused with gasoline.

It was not known who was to blame for torching the tents. Cartel-backed gangs often draw suspicion in any border attacks because of their penchant for preying on migrants and demanding money for passage through their territory. But a government official suggested the fires could have been set by a group of migrants frustrated over their long wait in Matamoros to cross the border.

“The people fled as their tents were burned,” said Gladys Cañas, who runs the group Ayudandoles A Triunfar. “What they’re saying as part of their testimony is that they were told to leave from there.”

There were no reports of deaths or significant injuries. But about 25 rudimentary shelters made up of plastic, tarps, branches and other materials were torched in a sparsely populated part of the camp. Many who lived there also apparently lost clothing, documents and whatever other modest belongings may have been left inside.

Margarita, a Mexican woman staying at the camp, said Friday she saw migrants from Venezuela screaming during the previous day’s blaze.

“They had their children with them and a few other things they had a chance to get,” Margarita said. She spoke on the condition that her last name not be published.

Gangs recently threatened migrants who were wading across the river border illegally, as well as their guides, Margarita said, but the crossings had continued.

However, Juan José Rodríguez — director of the Tamaulipas Institute for Migrants, a state agency coordinating with Mexico’s federal government — said he had no information that a gang was responsible for the fires.