Under the scorching morning sun, a restless crowd gathered around an immigration official in a remote corner of Mexico, each person pleading for a chance to board a departing flight.
Unlike their previous ambitions to reach the United States, many now seek to return to Venezuela or simply escape this city—if only they had passports, documents, or the means to leave.
At least 3,000 Venezuelans are stranded in Tapachula, a sweltering city near Mexico’s southernmost border, once a gateway for migrants coming from Guatemala. Not long ago, the streets teemed with thousands of people, filling shelters and sleeping in yards, parks, and plazas.
Today, the city has fallen silent. Shelters sit empty, and parks where families once crowded are now deserted.
The flow has reversed. One by one, migrants board buses, retrace their steps on foot, or cross the Suchiate River by raft, heading back to Guatemala and their home countries.
This marks a growing wave of reverse migration: individuals who, confronted by stringent policies implemented during the previous U.S. administration, have made the difficult decision to return to countries they once fled—places scarred by violence, poverty, and climate change—putting aside, at least temporarily, their hopes for a better life.
Thousands remaining in Tapachula lack the documentation or resources to do anything but wait. Mexico’s immigration restrictions, enforced under pressure from recent U.S. governments, prevent them from leaving the city and complicate any attempt to return to Venezuela.
“We are trapped,” said Patricia Marval, a 23-year-old Venezuelan woman eight months pregnant, struggling to care for three children in a single-room concrete block shack.
Her partner works daily in a carpentry shop, earning just enough pesos for rice and tortillas, but never enough to buy diapers for Siena, their one-year-old daughter. Some nights, hunger haunts them as they sleep.
The desperation is overwhelming. Marval revealed she has even considered asking a neighbor to care for one of her children so the others might eat three meals a day. “If I could leave one behind, I swear I would,” she said through tears. “But I can’t.”
Between 8,000 and 10,000 migrants face similar circumstances scattered across the southern state of Chiapas, according to Eduardo Castillejos, deputy secretary of a state agency responsible for migrant affairs at the southern border. Most come from Venezuela, Cuba, and Haiti, originally hoping to reach the United States.
Venezuelans, he explained, are the most desperate to leave and encounter the greatest obstacles. Without resources or travel documents, “these people have run out of options,” Castillejos said. “They are facing an ant-like struggle.”
He emphasized the need for greater resources to employ and integrate migrants, not only in Chiapas but throughout Mexico. “Mexico is no longer just a transit country; little by little, we are becoming a destination country,” he said. “We need to adapt to this new reality.”
To avoid harsh tariffs threatened by the previous U.S. administration, the Mexican government has intensified efforts in recent months to stem the flow of migrants heading toward the U.S. border.
Migrants in Tapachula cannot leave the city or state without a special migrant permit granted after applying for asylum—a process that can take months. Those attempting to travel without proper documentation often face immigration checkpoints on buses and highways, where officials frequently detain travelers lacking required papers, according to interviews with dozens of migrants and rights advocates.
Those seeking to leave Mexico confront further hurdles, as many lack valid passports, transit permits, or identification documents. Those without means to make the long journey must wait to be selected for humanitarian flights arranged by Mexico, pending approval from the Venezuelan government for their return.
Currently, thousands remain on waiting lists for flights to Venezuela, according to a government official who spoke with migrants but declined to be named due to authorization restrictions.
“It feels like being in prison because we can’t go anywhere,” said 24-year-old Mari Angeli Useche, who left Venezuela eight months ago hoping to reach the United States and now awaits a humanitarian flight home before giving birth in about three months.
For some, especially those who have been traveling for years, the wait is unbearable.
Keila Mendoza, 34, fled Venezuela eight years ago en route to Colombia, hoping to eventually reach the United States. Along the way, she met her partner and gave birth to two children, now aged seven and three.
They arrived in Tapachula six months ago, where her ordeal began. Mendoza was kidnapped for seven days by criminals demanding ransom and stealing what little money the family had. Soon after, her partner abandoned them.
Now Mendoza works domestic jobs at a local grocery store to pay for food and rent, though there is often not enough to cover both. “Sometimes I don’t even have enough to feed my children,” she said.
The only documents she holds are her children’s Colombian identity papers, proving their nationality. Despite her desperation, the thought of returning to the country she fled years ago fills her with fear.
“I want to go home, but I have nothing there, no one waiting for me,” she said. “How do you start over from scratch?”
Many migrants stranded in Tapachula have even less documentation. Some women have raised children born during their long journeys from Venezuela in countries like Peru and Colombia, resulting in children with different nationalities but without official papers to prove their identities. Without birth certificates or passports, their uncertain futures hang by a thread.
“I’m desperate to leave, but I can’t; I don’t know what to do,” said Marval, mother to Alan, 7, born in Venezuela; Ailan, 4, born in Colombia; and Siena, 1, born in Peru.
Overwhelmed by hopelessness, she said she has sometimes contemplated ending her life. But the thought of causing deeper pain to her children has stopped her, she said.
Many mothers feel their only options are impossible. Marielis Luque, who left Venezuela eight months ago with her two daughters after traveling through seven countries, was kidnapped in Tapachula and forced to pay $100 for her freedom—a sum unattainable for many in the city.
“I regret coming here and making my daughters live through all this,” she said tearfully. “But staying in Venezuela, where there is nothing, would have made me a bad mother too.”
Increasingly, those able to return south are choosing to do so.
Near the city center, a group of about 30 Venezuelans waited calmly for a bus headed to Guatemala, the first step on their long journey home. Some had self-deported from the United States; others never reached that border. But they shared two things in common: the desire to return and just enough money to make the trip possible.
“It’s better to go hungry in your own country than in a foreign land,” said 33-year-old Deisy Morales moments before boarding the bus. “I’m going home!”
