U.S.
Sarah Burge / The Press-Enterprise / AP
A group of protesters shouting anti-immigration slogans blocked the arrival of two buses carrying 136 undocumented Central American immigrants to a U.S. Border Patrol station in California on Tuesday.
Several dozen protesters, some waving U.S. flags, converged outside the site in Murrieta, California, about an hour drive from San Diego.
Mounting a physical barrier to the vehicles, some of the demonstrators carried signs reading, "Return to sender."
In response, the buses backed away from the facility. Their next destination was not immediately known.
Earlier in the day, the undocumented migrants — a group of adults and their children — flew to Southern California from Texas, where they had been held at overcrowded facilities. After being processed at the Murrieta facility, officials said the migrants would most likely be released under limited supervision to await deportation proceedings.
A day earlier, Murrieta Mayor Alan Long urged residents in the suburb of 107,000 people to call their elected officials and voice opposition to the plan. He said police in the city were ready for any security issues, though he acknowledged migrants were not to be released locally and do not have criminal records.
The migrants’ flight was part of a federal government effort to deal with a flood of Central American children and families fleeing to the United States to escape violence and extortion from gangs in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras. Last week, U.S. authorities announced the plan to fly migrants from the Rio Grande Valley to Texas cities and Southern California.
More than 52,000 unaccompanied children have been detained after crossing the Texas-Mexico border since October in what President Barack Obama has called a humanitarian crisis.
Obama announced Monday that in the absence of congressional action, he plans to move forward with his own executive actions to address the long-stymied issue of immigration reform.
The White House has already announced that it would seek more than $2 billion to address the humanitarian crisis of tens of thousands of unaccompanied children crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally since late last year.
The facility in Murrieta has no showers or beds and is designed only for temporary holds, said Gabe Pacheco, a spokesman for the San Diego chapter of the border patrol agents' union.
Another flight was expected to take 140 migrants to a facility in El Centro, California, on Wednesday, said Lombardo Amaya, president of the El Centro chapter of the Border Patrol union. The Border Patrol would not confirm that arrival date.
The federal government is also flying migrants to the Texas border cities of Laredo and El Paso and to Arizona for processing.
Al Jazeera and wire services
With Republicans refusing to take up a bill, the president says he will move forward with executive actions
The White House is requesting emergency funds and new powers to deal with influx of unaccompanied immigrant children
States don't need Congress to pass immigration reforms
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