SAN DIEGO (KGTV) — ABC 10News frequently hears about migrants from Mexico and countries in South America seeking asylum in the U.S.
But as Spencer Soicher reports, our team in the field keeps seeing migrant from a spot that some may not be as familiar with: Mauritania.
"I was oppressed in my country, even though I was a football player," one Mauritanian migrant said.
During summer 2023, 10News met a Mauritanian migrant at the Iris Transit Center in Otay Mesa West as he was on his way to New York.
Mauritania is a country in West African with a population of about 4.6 million people. But data obtained by the Associated Press shows Border Patrol encounters with Mauritanian migrants have skyrocketed.
In Jan. 2021, there wasn't a single encounter nationwide. In Jan. 2022, the number grew to nine, then it jumped to 282 by Jan. 2023.
The encounters stated to balloon: In March 2023, 1,500 migrants from Mauritania were encountered at the border. By June 2023, the number was at 2,700.
The AP reports the spike is happening in part because of a newly discovered route through Nicaragua with relaxed entry requirements; it allows people to buy a low-cost via without proof of further travel.
TikTok influencers have promoted the method, and migrants are then bussed north with help from smugglers.
We asked Customs and Border Protection for more up to date data on Mauritanian migrant encounters, but we didn't find that information in the data they pointed us to.
Still, our team continues to see Mauritanian migrants locally, both at the airport last week and at the Iris Transit Center Tuesday morning.
"I came to the United States yesterday," a migrant told 10News. "I'm leaving Mauritania because there is neither security nor freedom."
"There's a lot of poverty in my country. There are no jobs — a lot of corruption. I came here to get a job and support my family," a migrant said in Arabic.
The U.S. State Department issued a travel advisory for Mauritania last summer. It told Americans they should reconsider traveling to the country, saying violent crimes are common and police lack the resources to respond effectively to serious crimes.
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