As news of I.C.E. raids continues to reach my ears and no real human rights centered immigration reform plan in sight, I have started to call the combination of increased enforcement and emphasis on border security over valuing the lives of immigrants, The Triple D Immigration Reform plan: Detain, Deport, & Disappear/Dead.

While SB 1070 doesn’t officially go into effect until next month, it’s effects and the effects of the eventual deployment of additional National Guard troops at the border are already being seen in the desert between Mexico and Arizona, with migrants taking more dangerous routes into the United States and losing their lives in record numbers.

According to an article on Arizona Central, forensic anthropologists in Pima County, Arizona have seen an increase in the number of dead they are finding in the desert.

[Trigger warning : The article from Arizona Central may be very graphic for some with it's description of the dead found in the desert].

There had been 88 already this year, an increase of more than a third over what it was a month ago and well above the norm for this time of year.

Here in NYC, far from the desert, the new summer has already brought near record heat so I cannot even fathom the heat in the desert on the frontera. I suspect that this will be a long, hot summer for the migrantes who continue to risk their lives in hope of a better future and it means we need to keep the heat on states like Arizona, places that strive to copy their anti-immigrant policies, and the U.S. federal government that continues to sit on it’s hands on the dead backs of migrantes and their familias.