Roughly 80 percent of migrant women are sexually assaulted on their journey, and most of them are unaccompanied minors. The majority of these incidents go unreported and unpunished, leaving these women feeling more vulnerable than ever. The coyotes, otherwise known as “people smugglers,” are primarily the ones responsible for these attacks, and they leave the underwear of the women they raped hanging on trees as if to symbolize their dominance and victory. These sites have been spotted and photographed throughout the U.S-Mexico deserts, but perhaps because of the lack of publicizing, no one seems to talk about the problem of rapes in border regions. Migrant women are marginalized and targeted for sexual abuse, and rarely is someone held accountable. Their voices are silenced, and nothing has been done to raise awareness of this issue. Rape has become a part of the migrating journey, and this needs to be stopped.

43-year-old Maria Salinas spoke up about her migrating experience, and her accounts were shocking. She revealed that women used last stops at pharmacies in Mexico before the crossing to ask about (and purchase) contraceptives. Women were already prepared for sexual assaults. They understood the situation as one where they were at the will of the people that were transporting them, and the coyotes themselves enforce this master-slave relationship while on the trip. Coyotes even advise clients to go on birth control, as if to remind the women of their vulnerability and to give them a terrifying forewarning of what was to come.

When Maria fell behind while trekking the long desert, the leader coyote attempted to bargain with her. He said he would have the group wait for her if he could have sex with her daughter. When Maria and her daughter both refused, the coyote left them behind in the desert and swiftly led the rest of the group onwards—this itself is a rare occurrence. In most situations, Salinas said, the coyote would not respect the refusal and force his request anyway. The only reason Maria and her daughter are alive to tell this story is because the Border Patrol found them after a few days. They would not have survived for long in the middle of the desert, abandoned by the leader coyote.

Thousands of similar stories remain untold. Some women are scared to come out and speak about their experiences, while others are not alive to tell the story. They have no one to turn to for help and support, and they remain suppressed because of the intersectionality of race, gender, class, and status of citizenship. Despite the stances taken on immigration issues, I see this problem of sexual assault on migrant women as one about basic human rights. No woman should “expect” rape and harassment, and more awareness needs to be raised to help these vulnerable women.