‘I’m trying to be something’: the migrant kids struggling to make a new life in the US

Houston has become the top destination in the country for unaccompanied migrant children in search of safety, opportunity and family

Cars and helicopters descended on Alex almost as soon as he crossed the Rio Grande River. He was an 11-year-old boy trying to see his mom. Border agents threw him in a freezing cell, then handcuffed him.

That was Alex's introduction to the United States, a place he hoped would become his new home. But even after he left government custody to join his family in Houston, Texas, his future was unsettled at best. He recalls how at school, a classmate told him to go back to El Salvador.