Victims of violent cartels say BBC that they are now hiding from US authorities

She promised her daughter a trip to the Disney world in Florida – but what was originally planned as a holiday became the way of escape from “terror”.

Gabriela, not her real name, originally from Guayakil, Ecuador, where she headed what she calls “the usual middle -class life”: she worked on the TV channel for 15 years, she had a mortgage, and her daughter attended a private school.

When she read the headlines that Ecuador is increasing – Gangs fighting for routes to trade cocaine.

Then came the first threat: the phone call to warn her to pay the gang or shoot. Calling knew your workplace and your number.

About the time of their planned Disney holiday, her daughter’s grandfather was abducted.

Her family was asked to pay tens of thousands of dollars and received videos showing his fingers. Eventually he was killed, the finger left in the bottle as a mockery – To the right reported by the BBC.

Fearing that Gabriela would not be safe in Ecuador, her partner ordered her to take her daughter on a trip and not return.

Now Gabriella is one of the millions in the United States, which are waiting for asylum statements. Although the exact figures are unavailable, many applicants from Latin America say they were expelled in a cartel that has taken off in several countries, including Ecuador.

But immigration experts say it is increasingly difficult for them to start their business in the US.

The US asylum law recognizes five reasons for protection against a convention for refugees developed after World War II. They are persecuted on the basis of: race, religion, nationality, political thought or membership in a particular social group.

The current US Civil Service and the immigration service states that the shelter can only be provided to those who run away from persecution based on one of these five groups, but the violence in the carts does not fit neatly in any of these categories.

According to Kathlein Bush-Joseph of the Institute of Migration Policy, this law is the subject of “a lot, a great interpretation”.

During the first term of the US President Donald Trump, his administration complicated the people to seek asylum from violence in the gang or in the family – two categories that seem to be about crimes between people, but in many countries are related to systemic issues of justice and corruption.

The Attorney General Trump raised the bar on these requirements, issuing the directive that “the applicant must show that the government justified private actions or demonstrated the inability to protect the victims.”

It can be difficult. Gabriela says the report on threats in a country such as Ecuador may be risky. “If you are lucky and they caught the criminal, he will probably come out the next day and try to kill you.”

While Baden’s administration has abolished this legal interpretation, the law remains unchanged, and those who escape from the cartels feel in the suspended state.

Donald Trump also made criminal cartels the purpose of his immigration policy – By assigning some terrorist organizations and Deporting those he claims to them linkedIn some cases without providing evidence.

Ms. Bush-Joseph says it is too early to tell how it will be played in the courts, but it can go “both ways” for those who escape from violence in the cartel.

This can classify some of them as victims of “terrorists”. But there is concern that those who were forced to pay the extracts may also be accused of providing “material support” to these groups – even if it was forced.

Gabriela agrees with Trump that the members of the cartel are “terrorists” and believes that his government should recognize her and other victims: “I would like the president to seek shelter to those who escape from these terrorists.”

Mario Russell, Executive Director of the US Center for Migration Research, believes that the legal definitions of the one who can claim that the shelter should be updated.

He says that the majority of the victims still say that shelter on political grounds, arguing cartels, has so much social and political power that they act “as if a management organization.”

“The problem is that these people suffer from violence and persecution, and under persecution we mean horror. There is fear for their lives.”

Gabriela says that she has not yet been given a date in an interview with asylum – she plans to ask for political asylum. She claims that some police and judges in Ecuador will be corrupt and related to gangs, she did not feel that she would be protected from the threats involved in her country.

Mr. Russell says about 70% of all claims to the shelter are already deviated. According to him, the Trump administration is an increase in the detention of migrants in the country irregularly, but seek asylum.

Now they show a record 60,000 people, waiting to submit their affairs, show data.

Mr. Russell says that “changes this equation” because they can “no longer live their lives relatively peace” when they expect a decision on their claim. The detention, he adds, “uses” as a way of encouraging people to refuse and voluntarily accept deportation.

President Trump’s latest executive orders have expanded the powers to stop the US immigration and customs bodies (ICE), including the suspension of entry for many undocumented migrants.

As a result, says Ms. Bush-Josef, a environment where judges face “huge pressure” to deny cases that are not considered legally sufficient.

Direct political cases can be approved quickly, but the cases of the cartel are complex and often deviate at the first review, she says. These applicants must “fight for the defense”, colliding with some “highest deportation”, she adds.

For applicants, such as Gabriel, it means an effective life in the blocking. “We were afraid as President Trump took office,” she says.

She has a work permit, while her refuge claim is excellent and long changes in handmade at the American factory. “Our life consists of work, home, work, nothing else. I don’t want to expose us to another injury.”

“This is tense, unable to go out, rest, forget about our injuries,” she says, adding that she is afraid to report and arrest.

She is concerned about the following speed limit, fearing that any mistake could justify her deportation or reject her requirement. She politely replies to everyone, even when she survived racism.

Gabriela’s fears are shared by Maria, a lesbian from the Ecuadorian city of Duran, which occupies one of the most violent in the world. The gang also tried to demand her by sending her threatening text messages.

She filed a complaint to the prosecutor’s office in Ecuador, but a week later the criminals pulled her out of the motorcycle, warned her to pay and said, “Because you think you are a man, you think nothing will happen to you.”

Maria sold the bike and fled to the US, where the dishwasher is now operating in New York.

She told us about immigration officials about the complaint she filed in Ecuador, but her shelter is not planned until 2028, and for Mary it means that she “cannot enjoy life.”

“You have to hide, you don’t know when a raid can happen,” she explains.

In the US, there is a lag of about four million asylum cases waiting for feelings, and for many, like Mary, the process takes years.

Louis, a taxi driver who fled to the US after the gang tried to extort drivers from his cooperatives, is another.

“I never thought about emigration. But so many of my friends were killed,” he says of those who refused to pay.

According to an immigration law firm Spar & BernsteinInstead of helping the case of people who fled with violent gangs, the appointment of the US government for some cartels as terrorist groups can actually cause some applications to be found inadmissible.

Persons who paid smugglers to help them get to the United States or those who “worked in the town controlled and paid for defense” can be considered as links to the same groups from which they try to avoid – and see how their claims to the shelter were dismissed.

US Citizenship and Immigration Service Matthew J. TrageSR says the US asylum law protects “a very limited number of persecuted foreigners.”

He also accuses the lag of “false and frivolous” claims provided by the Biden administration, and says that the new legislation will increase the shelter fee to reduce fraud.

“In anticipation of the claim to the asylum does not force the aliens to insure against forced execution,” he adds.

Meanwhile, Americans look like a split on Donald Trump’s immigration. Pew research poll has found that 60% did not approve the suspension of most shelter applications; 54% oppose the increase in raids. But the support is very divided by party lines.

Most (65%) support the legal paths for the residence of unregistered immigrants, while 23% are worried that they or someone close can be deported.

Gabriela, Maria and Louis insist that those who escape from the Cartel violence are misunderstood. They accept why criminals can be deported, but believe that law -abiding immigrants “pay taxes” deserve to remain.

“We want everything they want: to work, to live in a state of law and no longer live in horror, not knowing whether you will return or your child.”