For undocumented youth who commute between El Paso, Texas and Juárez, Mexico for school, finding a community to connect with and feel safe in is especially challenging. The Christian youth organization Young Life is there to fill that gap in immigrant students' lives by offering emotional and spiritual guidance as well as a support system that deals with any and all issues that arise, whether citizenship-related or not. The group has mentored hundreds of high school students whose lives straddle the border over the years, and many of those credit the group with helping them make sense of their "messy" lives.

To continue serving tens of thousands of refugees stuck at the U.S.-Mexico border during the pandemic, shelters have collaborated on an improvised system to deliver food aid, emergency hotel accommodations, and legal aid via videoconferencing. The border buildup of recent months, a product of the “Remain in Mexico” asylum policy, became a far more complicated humanitarian mission thanks to COVID-19. After completely shutting down, some shelters are cautiously reopening with new protocols to serve a more socially-distanced clientele.

Volunteers with the Embassy Church visit detainees once a week upon request, with about 15 to 20 volunteers spending time with people during four one-hour shifts. As they built relationships with the detainees, volunteers fundraised to hire immigration lawyers and help people through the asylum process.

In Nogales, Mexico, La Casa de Misericordia y de Todas Las Naciones provides food, shelter, and education to migrants while they work through the process of applying for asylum in the United States.