Immigration
Trump nomination sparks migration panic as new caravan struggles to reach U.S. border before election
The caravan is one of several that migrants have joined just four months before the presidential elections in the United States, which has been enduring a massive influx of illegal migration
July 22, 2024 1:18pm
Updated: July 23, 2024 7:43am
A new caravan made up of some 3,000 migrants from countries in Central America, South America and Africa left this Sunday from the Mexican town of Ciudad Hidalgo, Chiapas state, located on the Guatemalan border as part of an attempt to reach the U.S. border.
The caravan leaves in the midst of the commotion generated this week among migrants by the Republican Party’s third nomination of former President Donald Trump for the November presidential elections, and his threats of mass deportations as part of a tougher immigration policy, as he faces the prospect of being elected president a second time.
A new caravan heading to the U.S. border
According to activists, the latest caravan is the largest in recent months and is composed mostly of families on foot who carrying small children in their arms. The caravan is moving at a slow pace and hopes to advance 40 miles from Ciudad Hidalgo to the city of Tapachula, where they will rest before heading north.
Carlos Izaguirre, a migrant from Honduras told the EFE Spanish language news service that, if Trump is elected president, he will carry out mass deportations because the current president, Joe Biden, opened the border and there is a lot of crime in the United States.
“When Donald Trump is president, there will be millions of deportations for Central America,” he speculated. “It affects us because we have children and families. Thank God for the economic aid and the remittances we send with that we help our families because we are not only Central Americans, South Americans and Mexicans. Migrants. There are close to forty million Mexicans living there in the United States,” Izaguirre told EFE.
The caravan is one of several that migrants have joined just four months before the presidential elections in the United States, which has been enduring a massive influx of illegal migration.
According to an October 2023 report published Customs and Border Protection (CBP), some 324,000 citizens of Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador arrived at the southern border U.S. that year.
Migration in Mexico has grown significantly since 2018, when caravans with thousands of migrants, mostly Central Americans, began to enter with the aim of crossing the country to reach the United States and the arrival of migrants has continued in recent years despite of the pandemic and the restrictions imposed by countries in the region.
Migrating to the United States to seek work
Also traveling in the caravan is a Peruvian migrant who gave interviews under the name ‘Franco’ who said his only objective is to get to the U.S. to work and earn money to help his family in his home country.
The Peruvian citizen, who is carrying a suitcase packed with his belongings, thinks that Trump's past comments vilifying migrants is wrong.
“It is wrong (Trump) because it does not allow migrants who have been fighting, sweating and overcoming various obstacles to get ahead. They should support the migrants. No one is a criminal. Everyone has a purpose in this life, and there are people here who have values, who know how to show respect, who want to get ahead, who work every day, and who have always earned money with the sweat of their brow,” the Peruvian told EFE.
Another migrant interviewed, Colombian Alberto Lizarazo said that people traveling in this caravan are human beings and the future.
“He is a good president, I admire him, but sometimes he exaggerates,” said Lizarazo of Trump, who is about 60 years old and walks with the help of a walker because he fell while traveling through the Darién Gap jungle land bridge that connects South and Central America.
Despite his current physical challenges, he has not lost hope of reaching the United States to find work.
Last Friday, the Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, announced that he would send a letter to Trump about migration and the border between both countries because, in his opinion, he is not well informed.
The letter, which will be sent next week, will also address "the importance of maintaining economic integration" between Mexico, the United States and Canada, since "closing the border does not solve anything.”
On Thursday Trump warned of a “migrant invasion” and vowed to close the southwest U.S. border with Mexico on the first day of his potential second term.
