Thousands of foreign-born U.S. veterans have been deported to Mexico and other countries — where drug cartels, gangs, and terror groups recruit them, NBC News reported.
The issue is explored in depth in "Ready for War," a Showtime film premiering Friday night.
"In Mexico, we have to deal with the cartels, but what about the guys that are deported to the Middle East and they gotta deal with ISIS and all this other terror organizations," U.S. Army veteran Miguel Perez told NBC News.
"This is a worldwide problem when it comes to deported veterans."
Perez, who was raised in Chicago and later deported to Mexico — he was a legal resident when he served in the military — is one of the vets featured in "Ready for War," telling filmmakers he was approached by drug cartels when he was at a U.S. prison for nonviolent drug crimes.
"Certain people were like, look, if you get deported, you have nothing to be worried about," he said. "In other words, it's 'We're claiming you.'"
Most deported veterans are sent to Mexico, where they were originally from, where they face death threats from gangs and drug cartels looking to recruit them because of their military training, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.
Mike Vigil, a former Drug Enforcement Administration chief who also worked as an undercover agent in Mexico for 31 years, told filmmakers between 60-70% of all drugs smuggled into the United States go through the Juárez-El Paso corridor, meaning veterans deported to Mexico are in the hands of a "deadly enemy" and "have basically created a national security threat," NBC reported.
In Perez's case, he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder after serving two tours in Afghanistan in the early 2000s, and hit with 15 years in prison after drug convictions in 2010, NBC News reported.
After doing time, immigration authorities detained Perez, who was a legal permanent resident, and put him up for deportation.
Though Perez's lawyer argued cartels in Mexico would likely recruit him if he was booted, ICE deported him last year to Tamaulipas — which has a "do not travel" advisory "due to crime and kidnapping," according to the U.S. Department of State.
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