The Border Has Eyes

These towers. They're like high tech scarecrows out in the desert. They're mounted at around one hundred feet tall because the whole purpose of the towers is get up and above the landscape, so you can see a wide area and if you can see the towers right, they can see you.

Fran Fuduro Media and PRX. It's Latino USA. I'm Marienno Rossac. Today a story about how new bordered technology is impacting communities in the United States. We go to Arizona, where private companies built some of the first surveillance towers on the US Mexico border, and we're going to take a look at what these towers mean today for our country, for the future of the people who are crossing, and for the future of the people who live on the border.

Hey, Ray, Hey Maria.

So Ray, you have been busy over the last several months. You've been researching surveillance technology, specifically technology that's being used on the US Mexico border. So tell me what has been your focus.

Yeah, well, let me start off by saying that you know both you and I have reported on the border for years now, and I grew up in the Roal Grande Valley of South Texas and I was an immigration reported there for a while.

Right, And you did a lot of strong reporting along the border. In fact, you were covering the last two years of the Trump administration, specifically policies like the Remain in Mexico program and the expulsions because of Title forty two.

Yes, I reported on those policies. And for this story, I decided to look at border technology and how it's impacting migration. And I specifically wanted to dig deep and better understand the the border surveillance towers that are there and these integrated fixed towers.

So that's a very high tech term, integrated fixed towers, because you know, when I think of border technology, I think of like drones, biometrics, you know, license plate readers, ground sensors, cameras everywhere. But you're talking now about then extra layer of surveillance, right.

Yeah, that's exactly right. And you know, these types of towers are just like one of several types of towers and everything that you just mentioned, Maria, as you know, is part of this bigger thing known as the virtual wall. It's also labeled as the cyber wall, and the US is pouring more and more money into this type of technology. As of early November, Maria, it's estimated that there are about five hundred surveillance towers across the entire US Mexico border.

Right and from where we are now, ray the politics of today is actually at both Republicans and Democrats support the expansion of this virtual wall, this cyber wall.

That's exactly right, and that's one of the reasons why I wanted to look at this issue. Now. You know, Madia, we know that a physical wall is controversial across political aisles, but both Democrats and Republicans seem to be in favor of border technology. And Madia, I think it's also important to say that, you know President Electrump's website. On it, there's a link to the gopiece platform, and it says that they are in favor of using quote advanced technology

You know, it turns out that this is a place where I've reported from several times on other border issues. It's also a place that Latino USA continues to go back to in our reporting exactly, Maria. Okay, Ray, So you're taking us to Tucson, Arizona. That's where you end up meeting with a group of people who tried to do something about these surveillance towers before they even went up. So take us there, take us to the story. Thanks Ray.

The tuthon sun is shining down on me as I walk towards a large, rusted colored gate. As I slid it open, a little lizard scurries away into the cracks on the wall, and there's a car waiting for me.

How you doing good?

I finally meet you.

That's Valentina Andrews. She goes by, Tina, I hop in her car and we instantly connect over our cats.

So thunder Cat is a big, fluffy brown taba Cali. She is just a short hair all black.

Cat oh Okay.

Tina was raised on the Thano Atam Nation, which is about an hour and a half southwest of Tucson, where she was born. The reservation is federally recognized and her people are known for thriving in the harsh desert climate. The reservation is about two point eight million acres, or about the size of Connecticut. The nation is made up of eleven districts and there's about thirty four thousand yearrolled members. The Thano Autumn people were separated when the border was created.

We're going to take a drive down south close to the border and check out one of those surveillance towers.

Tina and I are heading to a small town on the nation named Cells. Our plan is to meet up with Tina's friend Joshua Garcia. He's also a tribal member who was raised on the reservation. He lives in the Chickakook District, which sits on the border where some surveillance towers were built. Last a year, okay, Tina and I hop into his truck and head south to the Chickakook District on the border to go see one of the

From Combits to combat Vehicles, Elbit Systems technologies are operational in dozens of countries. Our solutions enable domination of the battle, to engage threats with power.

And precision, and they're also a global leader when it comes to the surveillance industry. Albert has actually used similar surveillance towers on their border with Palestine. This connection between Albert, Israel and Palestine was a concern that many on the nation stressed. Some on the thano Atam Nation felt that having this same technology on their land felt like an occupation.

Shoots tipman, take a look, Yeah that's ti. I just think somebody's watching this for sure.

Wow, these panels are huge.

The Elbeit tower is huge. It shoots more than one hundred and twenty feet into the sky. And it's about the size of a twelve story building. It looks like a metal communications tower or a cell phone tower. If you look closely, you can see a camera at the very top of it. These towers have the ability to see up to seven point five miles within its radius. That's about the length of more than one hundred and

Seeing it, just know that somebody's there watching us, and at the same time, you know, hearing the birds out there singing, and how it's just such a desecration to the space. So to me, it just makes me really sad to see the signs here on our own supposedly sovereign land.

Tina and Josh tried their best to fight against these towers, but ultimately they were constructed after leaders from the nation approved the towers on their land. It was reported that this happened in twenty nineteen. CBP secured enough money to allow for ten surveillance towers to be built on their lands.

Even though the community is on your side, but really it's those officials and our nation's governments that are the ones that are making these decisions. That's something that's the kind of hardest.

Thing but it doesn't stop there. Elbett has already been awarded a contract to build more surveillance towers, possibly including these same types of integrated fixed towers along the border in the next few years.

Looking back on it today and seeing where we're at and what it is and then actually standing next to one, you know, what we just did today was very very surreal and very like I'm just still like processing how tod theay Win.

Tina says that when the towers were being built across southern Arizona, there's been a steady presence of Border patrol agents in their community through the years, and they work hand in hand with the surveillance towers. The towers notify agents when they detect movement, and that tells agents that they need to monitor the area. So it's not just the towers on the border that Tina has seen and

New information out of Pima County tonight after member of the Telona Odam Nation was shot to death by Border patrol.

The autopsy shows that Raymond Mattia were shot at least nine times.

Raymond was reaching into his jacket to take out a cell phone, which law enforcement officials claimed they mistook for a gun. Three border patrol agents fired dozens of rounds at him. He was killed on the scene. Tina has also had her own run ins with border militarization. One moment really stands out to her. It was when border agents pulled her and her family over after the attendant and memorial service for her uncle.

Everybody in the car was like in a panic, and I was like trying to calm the situation because they had their guns drawn on us, and also I had to show proof and let them know this is who we are, this is where we're coming from.

Tina says she believes she was being racially profiled. She feels like she's part of the last generation on the nation to know what life was like before the intense and daily militarization and surveillance that goes hand in hand with the towers.

When I think of my nieces and nephews, who are you know, babies and range from the ages of their early twenties, they know that that's what they grew up seeing, and that's normalized to them, but for us, still not normals for us, and we I don't think we'll ever accept that. It's sad to even think that this could be potentially a permanent thing for us here.

Tina's fears about border patrol are informed by reality. In the last five years, at least two hundred and twenty two people were killed across the country during encounters with CBP. On top of that, DHS reported that there was an estimated four thousand border patrol agents nationwide in nineteen ninety two, and about thirty years later, in twenty twenty, there were almost twenty thousand agents. That's a growth of about five

You want to give border patrol officers the benefit of the doubt, but when majority of your experiences are not good and are negative when it comes to dealing with border issues, then of course, yeah, then that frustration starts to build.

Tina says her people were sold the idea that these towers would protect them, but in reality, she says, they feel more surveilled and have ultimately experienced more violence on the border. As Tina, Josh and I walk back to the truck, I seen empty black water jug that migrants use to stay hydrated on their journey into the US. I also see other things like clothes, backpacks, and shoes lying in the dry desert landscape. You know, we're really close to your community, you know. As we drive, just

Well, I just kind of always wonder where did they come from? What kind of circumstances led them to take this huge risk.

This region has been a corridor for migration through the years, and it's been extremely deadly. For me, it's.

Almost like a very surreal feeling because well, like it's all them people. There's a lot that goes with death, and so I always think, like, where are these people's spirits at. I hope they're found some kind of peace.

This is something that people living on the border think about a lot. How many people have actually died in this region. Several humanitarian nonprofits say that it's a number that is under reported by the federal government. But one thing that we do know is that these surveillance towers don't just keep their eyes on the borderlands. They're actually contributing to something much darker.

When we come back, dear listener, let you know, USA producer Renaldo Lanos Junior travels to another part of southern Arizona. He's going to help explain the funneling effect that these towers create by redirecting migrants to some of the most remote and deadly parts of the border. We're also going to hear about how some aid workers there are working to help prevent people from dying in the desert. Stay

What is that. That's exactly right, Maria, and it's actually building off some of the reporting that you and other Latino USA colleague have done throughout the years, and most recently it was a story in twenty twenty two by Futuro Investigates. Well, you talked about the prevention through deterrence policy. Here's a clip of you from that piece.

President Bill Clinton faced bipartisan pressure to quote do something about the border. He supported this policy of prevention through deterrence.

Yes, and now migrants are trying to stay out of the line of sight of these towers in fear of apprehension, you know, and for that reason they get funnel to remote parts of the desert. And to find out more about how these towers are arguably contributing to the deaths of those crossing, I met up with some activists in the Sonoran Desert who are witnessing this firsthand and who are trying to prevent these deaths from happening in the first place.

Okay, Ray, you're going to take on the story from here, thank you.

I recently met up with a group of volunteers. They're known as the Tucson Samaritans, and if their name sounds familiar, it's because we've had them on our show earlier this year for a story about the border wall, its impacts on a nearby town, and what daily life is like by the southern Wall in Arizona. I'm with them today because one of the things they do is that they leave food and jugs of water for migrants who might

Hi.

Good morning.

Hi, Yes, I'm right.

I'm nice to meet you.

Michael him Michael, worry me you no pearly yet. It's seven o'clock.

Brian and Michael are both volunteers with the Samaritans. Brian's been with them for several years now.

I think we're not loading back here.

Okay, it's seven in the morning, and it's kind of cool out right now, but I know that this is a place where temperatures can reach one hundred and eighteen degrees fahrenheit. Brian says that today they'll hit several water drops, and these spots are places he hasn't been to in a while. Hi, Michael, that's she's with the Colivity Center here in Tucson. The organization helps identify the bodies of

Food is probably the most important, because we've been fighting here, is that the food is gone.

Every time.

There's a bucket down there that we can seal.

A five gallon buckett bet Loove, Brian and Michael take granola bars, vienna, sausages, and other snacks to leave out for the migrants. They also grab several one gallon jugs of water.

All right, here we go.

We hike for about half an hour. These water drops across the border have been reported on a lot, but it also shows that the work is never over, and as the planet gets warmer, they say it's more important than ever. When we finally get to our destination, we see that there's already food and water there.

Every trip the last six months out here it's been empty, so we have to be out here regularly everywhere to see where we see signs of recent passage. We often try to put drops in an area like this, where it's in a canyon, there's only one place to walk, so if anybody's passing through here, unless they're on top of the ridges, they're going to find the supplies that we've.

Left still, Brian leaves extra food and water just in case, because nearby we see signs that there's been movement here. Backpacks, clothes and other items are scattered on the ground.

Cartels often have guides who can lead people north, although my understanding is that more and more it's being done remotely with cell phones and downloadable maps, so there could be groups out here who do not have a guide with them but simply get instructed in the morning. Here's where you need to get to by nighttime. Good luck.

This work of dropping off supplies for migrants and hopes that they find it in these remote areas feels like looking for a needle in a haystack.

And we have so far traced about fifteen hundred miles of paths that migrants walk on in a triangular area south of Tucson. That makes up about a thousand square miles, so fifty.

After a while, we rest for a bit. Then Brian, Bedla and Mike pack up their stuff and we hike back to their car. We're going to another water drop, this time it's close to the border wall. Brian says, Migrant roots are always shifting, but the roots seem to be in very remote parts of the border, and that's intentional. Many people are trying to stay out of the line of sight of surveillance towers. Its groups like the Samaritans

And it's really where I went on my intellectual journey becoming a researcher focused on the border, focused on border policing, technology, enforcement, infrastructure, and its impacts on human rights.

Jeff tells me that before the Elba Towers came to the area. Yeah, there was the two thousand and five Secure Border Initiative Network or sbi NET for short. As part of this initiative, billions of dollars were given to private companies like Boeing to build surveillance towers and other technologies across the border, including in Arizona.

You know, residents, I think, rightfully, you know, raised a lot of concern about privacy, right and there was this feeling that in fact, it wasn't so much like the desert or the border that was under surveillance.

It was them.

But sbi net ultimately failed. There were several technical issues and missed deadlines, and the technology itself wasn't living up to the promises of surveilling the border. The Obama administration canceled the program in twenty eleven. Then a few years later, Albert stepped up to the plate to build towers. This time the tech was better and ever evolving. Flash forward to today, Albitt and other companies are eating even more towers.

They're mounted at around one hundred feet tall because the whole purpose of the towers is get up and above the landscape, so you can see a wide area. That makes them really visible, and if you're out in the desert during the daytime or at night, it's really clear where they are in the landscape.

Migrants basically avoid being in the line of sight of these towers, but the towers can see in the dark because they have night vision cameras and sonar capabilities. When a tower detects movement, it lets border officials know that someone or something is within the range of the tower, so the agency says they'll send personnel to check it out.

That's what that means. Is like people are crossing in mountainous areas with more or rugged terrain that blocks the towers from various angles and increases the likelihood they'll get lost and injured and prolongs their exposure to extreme temperature. The smugglers who are helping guide them through the desert select routes of travel that are outside of the visible range of the towers.

The surveillance towers create a funnel effect that drives people to some of the most dangerous parts of the region, likely resulting in their death.

All of that is really in keeping with the kind of plan that the Border Patrol first laid out in nineteen ninety four.

This shows how prevention through deterrence has evolved through the years, first with Border Patrol agents, then checkpoints, a wall, and now surveillance infrastructure like these towers. Organizations in southern Arizona, like the Samaritans, are familiar with Jeff's work. That's why these volunteers are trying to prevent these deaths from happening in the first place. Back with Brian, Perla and Michael, we're driving up these huge hills by the border wall.

All right, we made it alive.

We make it over the hill and in the distance we see something. It's a group of four migrants. They're huddled underneath a blue tarp that they've attached to the border wall. They're trying to get some shade. We walked towards them and Brian offers them some food and water. The group says they're from across Africa. They tell us all of the countries that they've been through to get here.

Africa.

Peruado Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico and here. Yeah.

They say there were more people here earlier, but border patrol picked them up and took them away in vans to get processed. But there wasn't enough room for them, so the agent said they'll come back later. But it's been several hours.

Now where are you heading?

Do you have a destination in the United States? Family, Yeah, there's New York.

New York.

All right.

It's a long, long journey still, but you're here. You've gone a long ways and you've made it to the United States, so welcome.

Like yeah.

Brian, Perla and Michael go to the car and get water and food for them. Then we head out, and not too far away, there's another group of migrants near the wall. Four women sit under the shadow of the border wall. They're from across Latin America and they looked tired. One of the women here looks like she's in distress. She's crying. So I don't pull out my audio equipment and I just worked on my phone. They say they've been traveling for days. Brian, Mike w and Beerla give

To be a woman and to be in a situation so desperate, and to see them so young and where they will just seemingly trust anyone that comes in their path because they need assistance.

Bedla reflects on the intense reactions from the women we just came across.

We saw how the women started tearing up when she said and he never came back. That is a tale, That is a lie that is told in this desert, in and out right. But that is a very stressing to hear, just the psyche. Yeah, just like you have to be left behind, and then the trust that you have to put in someone that you have to keep yourself alive in one position until they come back and get you is so nerve wrecking.

As we're wrapping up our day, I see something and see the helicopter straight in the distance.

Where do you see it?

Straight ahead?

The helicopter's flying between some mountains, and it looks like it's headed straight towards us.

They're going to come close enough to identify us.

Really, Oh yeah, I look at this.

The helicopter gets pretty close. I can feel some of the gusts of wind from its propeller.

We might have tipped the ground sensor.

Yeah, I might have tipped a sensor walking that's round of sensors. From here, we can see the pilot of the helicopter and they're clearly trying to identify us. The sound is so loud, and then just like that, it flies away.

I'd never seen that before. That looked like, what the fuck was that they were taking our photos close up and they maybe of doing faithful recognition stuff.

The idea that we may have tripped a ground sensor sending a signal that there was movement in this region, causing the helicopter to go and check it out, it's mind boggling. Of course, there's no way of confirming if this was the case here, but it's definitely possible because the border is always watching and the technology in the borderlands is always talking to each other. Surveillance towers tell border agents is detected someone, or a ground sensor rings

Dear listener, When we come back, we look at the industry of border surveillance and where all of this tech is headed. We're also going to learn about who is profiting and what all of this could mean for the border if more surveillance towers and infrastructure come to the region. So stay with us. Yes, hey, we're back. When we left off, we learned about how the surveillance towers in southern Arizona are acting like deadly funnels for migrants who

Hey, Ray, Hey Maria.

So you've walked us through a lot of what has happened along the border already. But of course I'm also wondering from the business side of things, what companies are going to be building these new.

Towers right now. Several companies like Elbett have already been awarded millions of dollars to build more surveillance towers across the border, and some of those those towers could be autonomous towers that use artificial intelligence to better detect people, and some of them already exist in parts of the border, and this tech opens up an entire kind of worms because it appears that more and more AI will be

But your reporting is also letting us know that there are some people who are trying to never forget those who have actually died. So Ray, you're going to pick up the story and take it from here.

Where we're standing right now is right below an integrative fixed tower, which is probably about a quarter mile up the hill.

I'm with journalist and author Todd Miller. We're at the base of a large hill a few miles outside of Nogales, Arizona. From here, we can see a looming integrated fixed tower staring down at us.

Also, we're about to hike up this hill to get to this integrated fixed tower.

Todd wrote a book named Empire of Borders the expansion of the US border around the world. He's one of the main experts when it comes to surveillance technology.

My first thought as a journalist was, Oh.

I feel I need to be looking way more into this.

And I did. Actually, I did a number of trips.

I went to Israel and Palestine twice looking into the sort of tech companies and why you know, academics in Israel call Israel the homeland security capital of the world, and why it's the.

Place, per capita is that.

Is selling more of this type of border infrastructure around the world.

Well, it looks like we made it.

We are now right below a surveillance tower.

Todd says. This tower that we're looking at is one of the first Albert towers to be built here in southern Arizona back in twenty fifteen as part of a broader contract given to Albert the year before to build more than fifty surveillance towers across the Arizona Mexico border. Todd has not only researched these previous towers that were built, but he's also aware of the direction of where this technology is going in the near future.

And it just seems like the trends are the budgets don't go down, they go up. The innovation doesn't go down, it goes up. The private industry involved in it, they want to make money, so they're constantly innovating new products, so there's a motivation there.

Earlier this year, he saw the surveillance industry at play when he attended the seventeenth annual Border Security Expo more than three hundred miles away from Tucson in Elbaso, Texas. It's a convention where private companies like Albert listen to the needs of agencies like the Department of Homeland Security and pitched their tech and their ideas to them.

The organizers say there are nearly two hundred private companies at this expo, and they also say it's the largest event in terms of participation ever.

But this year's expo was a little different.

I find it really disturbing, you know, as a journalist, that they didn't allow journalists to register, and this is the first time in seventeen years, you know, that they've done this.

I was one of those journalists not allowed in. When I wrote to the Border Security Expo marketing team, I was told, quote our advisory board has decided to no longer allow press to attend end quote, but Todd still managed to get in because he's also a researcher and an academic.

Journalists have always been able to calm and report on this super important annual convention where the nuts and bolts of what the border is, where it's going, the idea that there's private industry involved in a profit motive, that those sorts of things should be public knowledge.

Todd said at the expo there was a growing talk of using more AI technology on the border. This is important because this type of tech is already being used on some surveillance towers, as I mentioned earlier.

So we weren't even thinking about them five years ago, and all of a sudden, autonomous towers.

And they're talking about how they can implement AI more into their workflows.

So the border of Reladians don't have to do like certain bureaucratic work because some sort of AI program can do that. Thus the Border of Atlasian can focus more on enforcement or arresting people.

But this also raises concerns if AI creeps into other border enforcement tools. Todd paints a pretty orwellian picture of what he thinks the future of the border could look like.

There's a request for proposals for drones. A drone that I saw a couple of years ago. I had Department of Homeland Security that wanted a drone that could fly into an area without being heard and then come down and take people's pictures and have a facial recognition biometric technology installed in it. So Zaur, We're headed like these autonomous drones flying everywhere over people's heads, with robotic dogs like running around in patrols making arrest.

If something like this were to happen and more AI is used, it could also raise new ethical and even legal questions.

What happens when the first robots shoots somebody and kills them. Could you imagine like a drone from a ten thousand feet up or five thousand feet shooting rubber bullets down down at people, or concussion grenades or whatever.

Todd says. These questions are important to ask because technology evolves so quickly, and some of the things that we see today, like the AI towers, were not really fathomable a few years ago. So it's all within the realm of possibility, especially if more heartline immigration hawks are elected into awe branches of government. A lot of this might sound like something out of a science fiction movie, but

At least nine people are dead and three thousand people have been injured across Lebanon after electronic paging devices used by the armed group Hezbolah exploded simultaneously this afternoon.

A group of journalists have filed a lawsuit in a US court against the NSO Group. That's the Israeli company that operates Pegasus spyware, which has been used to monitor and track journalist, human rights activists, and dissidence across the globe.

Todd also makes it a point to say he's heard counter narrative from some higher ups at the expo about AI.

Not that they're against AI, because there's everyone's talking about AI, but that making sure that the human personnel actually makes the final decisions about anything.

Here's audio that I obtained from a panel at the Border Security Expo where panelists discuss what changes they foresee when it comes to technology and securing the border.

What's old is new and it's people first always. The technology supplements the infrastructure.

That's David B. Miller with the Border Patrol. People like David think technology will make agents even better at their jobs, and with more technology comes bigger budgets. At the same discussion, the panelists talked about emerging threats and how foreign entities are ramping up their technology and AI and how it's important that the US keeps up.

The last love of defense. This great nation has this, the US Bordatrol. Without them, that breaks down. We're doing and each and every one of you, with your technologians and your abilities to focus on helping spray order.

And the message was clear. This was a bit of private companies in the audience to help US Border Patrol to provide the most up to date technology, and it was called in the federal government to also provide the money and resources to build even more surveillance technology. And more surveillance technology being deployed across the US Mexico border could make crossings and just living there even more dangerous. A group of about eight people are gathered in an

We are going to the US Mexico border to put a marker for someone who was founded a few months ago.

Alvardo says that he's been doing this work for more than a decade now. It's part of a project known as Don Mueren losuenos, or where Dreams Die. He remembers those who have died in the desert by placing crosses in the spots where they were found. The brightly colored markers stand out in the desolate landscape.

Those people had names, and they had families, and they have plans and dreams and feelings like all of us. They are looking for something that we all want, which is to find a place to call home and to be happy and have a way to support our families. And there's nothing illegal about that.

This project means a lot to Alvaro because he's an immigrant from Colombia. He moved to the US in the sixties for college. He says that each cross he plants into the earth has a deep connection to him and his story. After Alvedo and the others filter into two cars, it's time to drive about an hour southeast of Tucson, towards the Patagonian mountains on the border. We arrive at our destination and scope out the area.

So we're going to go up this little canyon right here.

Back up that way.

There are so many bright wildflowers beginning to bloom all around the group. And I walk towards a dried up riverbed with Alvedo leading with a GPS device in his hand.

Someone died here last month. There was a lot of rain in March, and this person either try to cross over something and he drowned.

Alvedo and the volunteers have a bucket with them. They dig a hole into the ground, carefully, place the cross into the hole and fill it with cement.

He was twenty one years of age when he was found. He was fully fleshed. He had been here today. You should not be dying on.

That young Alvardo says he got this information from the Pima County Medical Examiner's office in Tucson. He has worked with them closely for years. The man who drowned is one of more than one hundred migrants who have died in Arizona this year.

Did you bring the Holy water with you? You're already, because what is it's life here in the desert.

He places a rosary around the aqua colored cross and offers a moment of silence to honor the young man's life. As Alavado helps pack up, I think about all the times he's had to do this. He says, he stopped keeping track because it can be a lot. He goes out to the desert at least once every week to do this work. Alavado emphasizes to me that it's no coincidence that his death took place out here in the middle of nowhere.

The astrology of the border patrol was to make the trip as difficult as possible. Prevention through the terrence is to send people through the most difficult parts of the desert where there's no water, there's no help. All of the things that go along with that policy towers, higher walls, drones, sensors, more, border patrol ages have not impeded in any way people crossing.

Alvado isn't wrong. In Pima County, the Medical Examiner's Office has found at least four thousand remains since the year two thousand. People have died from things like hypothermia, heat exhaustion, and dehydration from crossing in the most remote parts of the desert.

So this country has spent billions of dollars importing technology from other countries. Who are who do this kind of creating walls and keeping people separated, and we're doing the same things here.

Alvado sticks a third cross of the day into the ground. This one is bright orange. A thirty year old man died here late last year.

So this is a symbol for one person who came looking for that, but he didn't make it. So is a moment for you to suppose for a moment I say to yourself, WHOA someone died here? How unfortunate. And that's what I'm hoping for, that that this crocess will elevate a little bit of attention that and a little bit of empathy.

More surveillance towers will be built soon. And with Trump's new pick of Tom Homan, a former Immigration and Customs Enforcement director, as his orders are and Stephen Miller as his deputy Chief of Stafford Policy and Homeland Security, and not to mention the Governor of South Dakota, Christinome as Trump's pick to lead the Department of Homeland Security, we will have to wait and see how immigration will play

We also see now this aggressive expansion of this surveillance infrastructure into Texas, into California, and I think it's very likely having the same effect of contributing to these patterns of mortality by causing people to walk longer distances to try to get around these surveillance towers and their view.

Shed a lot of hopes that one day, in the very near future, there can be a solution, because he says the current policies and technologies in place are not working.

Whether it comes from the Republic, comes down from the Democrats, they'll ever get together and come up with a policy that they agree with. Some of these debts may stop altogether, and I'm hoping that I'll be around to see that.

Until then, the border will continue to watch those who cross it or are simply around it, and those eyes are projected to not only get sharper, but also a lot bigger.

Today's episode was produced by Renaldo Leanos Junior with editing by Mitra Bonshahi. It was mixed by Julia Caruso with engineering support from JJ Carubin, and it was fact checked by Rosa na Guire. The Latino USA team also includes Jessica Ellis, Victoria Estrada, Stephanie Lebo, Andrea Lopez, Gruzsado, Luis Luna, Glorimar Marquez, Marta Martinez, Neur Saudi and Nancy Trujillo. Benile Ramirez is our co executive producer along with myself and I'm your host Mariaino Rossa. Join us again on our

Latino USA is made possible in part by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation for more than fifty years advancing ideas and supporting institutions to promote a better world at Hewlett dot org, the Heising Simons Foundation unlocking knowledge, opportunity and possibilities more at Hsfoundation dot org and Skyline Foundation