Protesters: ‘See that flower. That represents a child that’s being detained.’

Signs, flowers and tents line the entrance to the Tornillo detention facility housing migrant children and teens.

Immigration activists are camping out in protest for nine days.

“It’s a creative encampment and an occupation,” Elizabeth Vega, one of the protest organizers, said. “We believe that resistance is very important to the camp, but we also believe in assistance.”

The camp is full of crafts made by people all over the country, but the most prominent craft on site are handmade flowers.

“We can point to every single flower and say, ‘see that flower. that represents a child that’s being detained,” Vega said.

The activists are calling for the shutdown of the Tornillo facility, as well as all the detention centers around the country. However, the shutdown of the Tornillo facility is already planned, the government saying it will close once the last child leaves. But the shutdown of Tent City does not sit well with the activists.

“”It’s not enough to shut it down like they’ve been shutting these detention centers down where they’re just dumping families at the greyhound,” Vega said.

The activists blame US foreign policy for creating the situation at the border and say the US should care for them because the US created the hardships the migrants are fleeing from. They are also calling for a more fluid border that allows more people to cross freely.

However, according to a Harvard poll that came out earlier this year, 76% of American voters want more secure borders and 70% want stricter enforcement of immigration law.