Volunteers help migrants along the border between Mexico and Arizona amid threats from the US government

Sasabe, Arizona (CNN) — Paul Nixon’s mind wrestled with his heart as he saw a pregnant migrant woman cradled by her husband on a dirt road near a gap in the border wall surrounded by the desolate desert hills of southeastern Arizona.

It was chilly in the mid-afternoon as the young Mexican couple waited to surrender to US Border Patrol agents, and Nixon felt it was unlikely there would be agents on the remote highway for the next few hours.

But the dangers involved in offering help crossed his mind. Escorting the couple to safety would be a federal crime, and their group of volunteers was warned by agents that there were possible consequences of detention and confiscation of their vehicles.

But in the end, saving a vulnerable, pregnant mother outweighed the rest.

“The idea of ​​leaving him with the wall was impossible,” Nixon told CNN. He was afraid that the woman could go into labor at any time.

He helped the expectant parents into an SUV and headed several miles away to a makeshift camp, where immigrants can find water and snacks while they wait for Border Patrol agents to transport them to process their documents.

Nixon and his wife, Laurel Grindy, two retired teachers in their 70s, are involved with a group called the Green Valley-Sahuarita Samaritans, which helps migrants in distress at what is currently the busiest crossing on the southern border between Mexico and the United States. States, which—perhaps surprisingly—is located in Arizona, not Texas.

Federal agents in the Tucson Border Patrol sector arrested nearly 300,000 migrants from October through February, according to data from Customs and Border Protection.

This is 64% more than the number of immigrants detained in the Del Rio Border Patrol sector, which includes Eagle Pass (Texas), the focus of the current battle over border security between Texas and the Biden administration.

At the current rate, immigration apprehensions in southern Arizona could reach 800,000 this fiscal year, John Modlin, chief of the Border Patrol’s Tucson sector, told CNN. Modlin’s staggering estimate comes close to the total number of migrant encounters in the sector over the past three fiscal years combined.

On a recent CNN visit to this migration crossing point, nearly everyone we encountered was moved by the constant flow of people crossing the remote reaches of the mountain desert, and struggling to maintain their personal and professional ideals of service, compassion, and service. duty

We were with Nixon and Grindy as they drove up and down the same steep road where they had found the pregnant Mexican woman more than a month before. His SUV was filled with water, apples, oranges, string cheese and boiled eggs.

According to Grindy, eggs are a popular delicacy among immigrants who haven’t eaten a real meal in days.

The first stop was a temporary evacuation camp where Border Patrol agents picked up a Mexican couple hours after Nixon made a risky split-second decision to take them to safety.

But when they entered the camp, they saw a sign posted at the entrance that read: “Transportation of undocumented non-citizens is a federal crime pursuant to 8 USC 1324.”

Under the law, knowingly transporting or transferring a person who has entered or remains in the United States illegally is a crime punishable by imprisonment.

“We’re not manipulating anybody,” Nixon said. “We’re old. We don’t want to spend our last days in jail.”

Nixon was thinking of the vulnerable women, children and sick people around the world whom he saw walking up steep hills in flip-flops or ill-fitting footwear, he said.

The US According to a Customs and Border Protection (CBP) official, the signs were posted by the Tucson Border Patrol Sector to remind the community that transporting migrants is a serious crime under federal law. its short name in English). It’s the Border Patrol’s way of asking volunteers working in the area to leave the transportation of migrants to law enforcement, the official said.

Nixon now has a letter from the volunteer group’s attorney, which he shared with CNN, saying he is not breaking the law by transporting vulnerable people and is instead saving lives and alleviating human suffering. It is not clear whether the document will have any legal value. Nixon claims that the letter is a way of expressing to law enforcement that he believes their behavior is legitimate because it is helping vulnerable people.

‘Our farm could go up in flames’

Hands on the wheel, Nixon pointed to the section of border wall in front of the camp and said volunteers called the area “Little Havana” because groups of Cubans crossed at one point and the name stuck.

But the property where the camp is located is technically called “Rancho Tres Bellotas” and belongs to rancher Lori Lindsey.

Lindsey is a descendant of Italian immigrants and sympathizes with the migrants who have skirted the border wall and ended up in camps seeking relief.

On cold nights, when the temperature drops to 20 degrees, plastic tarps and tents on their land are the only thing that protects the women and children from the unforgiving conditions.

But he worries about the spread of disease because there are no bathrooms or running water. And the nightmare is worse: that his generosity may cost him everything.

Migrants trying to stay warm have started building bonfires in the camp, including mesquite trees, and there are fears that wildfires could spread, especially given the current drought and dry conditions in the desert.

“It’s not just our farm that could go up in flames, the entire Coronado (National) Forest could go up in flames,” Lindsay told CNN.

“This is our livelihood… other people go. This is our home.”

‘What keeps me awake’

Lindsey’s cattle ranch and the border highway that volunteers like Nixon travel are under the watchful eye of the Border Patrol, the federal law enforcement agency responsible for detecting and preventing the illegal entry of people into the United States.

One day last week, we joined Brett Howard, a helicopter pilot with the Air and Marine Operations, Customs and Border Protection branch, on a helicopter patrol along the border.

He looked to the horizon and said that in his 20 years at the agency he had intercepted migrants or drugs on every square mile as far as the eye could see. Jagged peaks dotted with saguaro cactus rise above deep valleys lined with bright yellow poppies.

Several generations of border walls criss-cross the area, with old barriers blending into the vegetation and new structures jutting into the sky like the backbone of a giant beast resting on rugged mountainsides.

According to Modlin of the Tucson Border Patrol’s sector, smuggling organizations smuggle thousands of migrants into some of the most remote areas on Arizona’s east side, where Nixon and Grindy volunteer, while the same groups smuggle drugs and bad guys on the west side.

The smugglers’ strategy is to pin down Modlin’s agents on the east side, in what he calls a “humanitarian mission”, while the team lets its guards down on the west side.

Since October, Modlin’s team has found 30,000 “gotaways,” that is, people who have entered the country illegally but have not been detained due to a lack of personnel and resources, he explains.

“That’s what keeps me up at night,” Modlin said. He warns that “Gottaves” may have a criminal record, traffic drugs or have ill will toward the United States.

Howard flew over the giant peaks of the Beboquivari Mountains and pointed out the smuggling routes that circled around the giant boulders. From the air, the scene looks like a death sentence for anyone without proper training and equipment.

“I wonder how far migrants and smugglers will go,” Howard told CNN.