Immigration: A Journey In Photos

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A Dangerous Journey by Train

Honduran Jose Humberto Castro, 26, clings to a freight train in 2010 as he makes his way to the United States border from Orizaba in the Mexican state of Veracruz. Every day, hundreds of Central Americans try to cross from Mexico to the U.S.

Too often, relentless and divisive posturing passes for reasoned discourse around the issue of immigration and immigrants in the U.S.

One side of the spectrum calls for government roundups and deportations of any U.S. resident who is suspected of being unable to prove American birth or officially sanctioned naturalization.

The other side believes that productive, non-citizen Americans, through their contributions to the country, have earned the right to a path to citizenship.

Somewhere in between are real people fleeing economic, societal and institutional hardships to seek a chance at a better life.

Click through for nine views of the human side of a national debate.

Photo: Eliana Aponte/Reuters

Living Outside the Law

Veronica Castro hugs son Rigo Berrelleza Castro as he arrives home from school in June. Daughters Veronica (rear), and Jennifer (right) look on outside their Phoenix, Arizona home. Castro, who had been living in the U.S. for several years as an undocumented immigrant, plans to return to Sinaloa, Mexico, with her four kids—who are legal U.S. citizens—now that her husband has been deported.

Photo: Joshua Lott/Reuters

Swimming Across the Border

Men stripped to their underwear walk back into Mexico across the Rio Grande River outside Laredo, Texas, in 2006. Carrying their clothes in plastic bags, the men were trying to swim into the U.S. across the river where it divides the U.S. and Mexico. When they spotted the U.S. Border Patrol watching them, they turned back.

Photo: Rick Wilking/Reuters

Border Check

A member of the Mexican immigration group Beta checks the border wall between Mexico and the United States during a patrol on the outskirts of Tijuana, Mexico, in 2006.

The Betas, or Grupos Beta, were established by the Mexican government to assist and protect the personal safety of migrants traveling through Mexico, regardless of country of origin or immigration status.

Photo: Carlos Barria/Reuters

Riding to the Northern Side

Honduran Alex Aleman, 27, rides a freight train in 2010 in Cordoba, in the Mexican state of Veracruz, on his way to the U.S. The Census Bureau’s American Community Survey reported that about 625,000 Hispanics of Honduran origin were living in the U.S. in 2009.

Photo: Eliana Aponte/Reuters

Restless Night

A migrant sleeps on an old mattress at a campsite outside Tenosique, Mexico, in 2008. The routes taken by people change daily as they try to avoid armed assailants, police, and drug cartels trying to get a cut of the revenue generated by the migrants’ passage.

Photo: Daniel Leclair/Reuters

Caught

U.S. Border Patrol agent Galen Huffman, right, takes down information from a group of Mexican migrants arrested in the Altar Valley, Arizona, in 2008. Horses have been part of the Border Patrol since the agency was founded in the 1920s, when they were used to secure U.S. borders against liquor smugglers and unlawful immigrants. The animals are now making a comeback.

Photo: Tim Gaynor/Reuters

Living and Working in the U.S.

Maria Jacinto, left, cooks dinner for her daughter Edith, 10, and friend Briana, 8, after returning home from a day working as a maid cleaning homes in Los Angeles, California, in 2006. Jacinto, 49, emigrated to the U.S. from Mexico.

The Department of Homeland Security and Office of Immigration Statistics estimates that 10.8 million “unauthorized immigrants” were living in the U.S. at the end of 2009.

Almost half of all maids and housekeepers employed in the U.S. are immigrants, says the Center for Immigration Studies.

Photo: Lucy Nicholson/Reuters

Mother And Son Separated

Eight-year-old Saul looks out the window of an apartment building in Tijuana, Mexico, where his mother, Elvira Arrellano, was staying in 2007. He was there a day after Elvira was deported from the United States following a long battle to try to stay in the country where her son was born.

Saul traveled to Tijuana from Chicago to see his mother.

Photo: Jorge Duenes/Reuters

Does the U.S. need tighter or more open borders to the south? Should productive, undocumented U.S. residents be granted a road to citizenship? Talk it out in COMMENTS.

Immigration’s Hard Road: A Journey North in 9 Photos

A Dangerous Journey by Train

Photo: Eliana Aponte/Reuters

Living Outside the Law

Photo: Joshua Lott/Reuters

Swimming Across the Border

Photo: Rick Wilking/Reuters

Border Check

Photo: Carlos Barria/Reuters

Riding to the Northern Side

Photo: Eliana Aponte/Reuters

Restless Night

Photo: Daniel Leclair/Reuters

Caught

Photo: Tim Gaynor/Reuters

Living and Working in the U.S.

Photo: Lucy Nicholson/Reuters

Mother And Son Separated

Photo: Jorge Duenes/Reuters

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