Announcements circulating on social media claim that a migrant caravan is heading for the US southern border. Following two massive hurricanes causing devastation across Central America, it’s understood that thousands of migrants from Chile, Cuba, Guyana, Honduras, Paraguay, and other Central American nations ravaged by storms are headed for the USA.

A report published by Bloomberg claims that one group of migrants is set to leave Honduras’ second-largest city, San Pedro Sula ‘in the next few days’, with rumors that a second group will follow in January.

Coordinator of non-governmental organization, the Guatemala Red Jesuita con Migrantes, Jose Luis Gonzalez, said: “There are going to be caravans, and in the coming weeks it will increase. People are no longer scared of the coronavirus. They’re going hungry, they’ve lost everything and some towns are still flooded.”

Change in US government

“When there is a change in government in the US or Mexico, caravans start to move because they are testing the waters to see how authorities respond. What they see is that the one who said he was going to build a wall and hated Latinos is on his way out,” Gonzalez added.

Just two weeks apart, Central America was struck by hurricanes Eta and Iota, which ripped through the region and caused major damage to infrastructure, homes, and crops. In Honduras, 100 people are thought to have died.

The migrant caravan is likely to cause tensions, especially amid the coronavirus pandemic. Authorities in Guatemala have already stated that people passing through the region on route to the United States will need a passport and must return a negative coronavirus test before being allowed to enter the country.

Test for Biden

News of a migrant caravan bound for the US has been described as ‘the first test’ of Biden’s promises on immigration to the US. The President-elect has vowed to overturn many of Trump’s controversial immigration policies, but without signaling that the borders will be flung wide open.

However, during a recent event, Guatemala’s President, Alejandro Giammattei said: “If we don’t want hoards of Central Americans looking to move to other countries with better living conditions, we have to make a wall of prosperity in Central America.”

Meanwhile, the Cuban government claimed that America only has itself to blame for its continued migration crisis, saying that Washington had provoked migrants by reducing the number of immigrant and tourist visas issued annually.

For Cubans in particular, the number of non-immigrant visas issued has slumped from 16,335 in 2017 to just 6,959 a year later. Meanwhile, the US also suspended its Cuban Family Reunification program.

Invasion

A previous migrant caravan bound for the US back in October 2018 was described by Donald Trump as an ‘invasion’. The outgoing US President has previously urged Mexico to stop migrants from reaching the US border.

Upon hearing of a migrant caravan heading to the US, made up of hundreds of people from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, Trump tweeted: “I have instructed the Secretary of Homeland Security not to let these large Caravans of people into our Country. It’s a disgrace. We are the only country in the World so Naive! WALL”

News of the latest migrant caravan comes after the US recently extended its Temporary Protected Status immigration program, which allows migrants from disaster-hit or war-torn nations temporary entry into the US.

Source: https://workpermit.com/news/migrant-caravan-heads-us-southern-border-20201211

The post Migrant caravan heads for US southern border first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Salvadoran migrant Carlos Gutierrez, part of a caravan of mostly Hondurans heading to the US, puts his shoes on at the international border bridge which links Tecun Uman, Guatemala and Ciudad Hidalgo, Mexico, on January 21, 2020.  JOHAN ORDONEZ/AFP via Getty Images

In a statement Monday, the Mexican government accused the caravan’s leaders of directing migrants to cross the river without considering how it would endanger children and other vulnerable members of the group. Five National Guard members sustained injuries as a result of Monday’s scuffle, the government said.

It’s not clear how many migrants were injured, but reports have indicated that at least some were. The Mexican government said it has provided medical care, including hospitalization, to migrants who have requested it, including some who appeared dehydrated.

Although some Hondurans intend to remain in Mexico and find jobs, most of those in the caravan are seeking transit through Mexico in the hopes of reaching the US border. It’s a signal that as long as violence and economic instability continues to drive Central American migrants out of their home countries, they will continue to seek refuge in the US — no matter how much the Trump administration pressures other nations to stop them.

What will happen to Hondurans in the caravan

As reports surfaced that a caravan was en route to the Mexican border last week, López Obrador had vowed that migrants could either request a work permit to remain in southern Mexico legally or claim asylum, but would not be permitted to travel to the US. Now, however, it appears that at least some of the migrants will be deported.

With the aid of the National Guard, Mexican immigration authorities sent over 400 of the migrants who attempted to cross the border to immigration detention facilities, where they will be screened to determine whether they have the right to remain in Mexico or will be sent back to Honduras. Women and children will be deported via plane, whereas others will travel via bus, according to the Mexican government.

As is standard practice in Mexico, those who claim asylum will be released from detention and processed by the Mexican Commission for Refugee Assistance (COMAR). The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNCHR), which has recently expanded its presence in Mexico to eight offices, has agreed to help COMAR identify migrants with asylum claims, a spokesperson for the agency said.

Honduras produces high numbers of people seeking asylum: In 2017, the most recent year for which data is available, the US granted asylum to 2,048 migrants from Honduras, compared with 1,048 from Mexico, 3,471 from El Salvador, and 2,954 from Guatemala.

Honduras remains a hotbed of gang violence, largely perpetrated by the international criminal gang MS-13, which formed in Los Angeles and was transplanted to Central America following mass deportations of unauthorized immigrants with criminal histories in the 1990s. The gangs facilitate drug trafficking, extort local residents, and force teenage boys to join.

The country also has the fifth-highest homicide rate worldwide, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as well as rampant government corruption and high rates of violence against women and LGBTQ individuals.

Hondurans likely won’t be able to seek asylum in the US

Migrants’ chances of evading Mexican authorities and being granted asylum in the US remain slim.

They may be returned to Mexico under the Trump administration’s “Remain in Mexico” policy, officially known as the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP). More than 56,000 migrants have been sent back to await decisions on their US asylum applications.

The Trump administration has also brokered a series of agreements with Central America’s “Northern Triangle” countries — Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras — that allow the US to send migrants back to those countries, though the agreement with Guatemala is the only one that has gone into effect so far.

The agreements resemble “safe third-country agreements,” a rarely used diplomatic tool that requires migrants to seek asylum in the countries they pass through by deeming those countries capable of offering them protection (though the Trump administration has been reluctant to use that term). Until recently, the US had this kind of agreement with just one country: Canada.

The administration has sought such agreements in Central America as a means of achieving Trump’s goal of driving down the number of migrants seeking refuge at the US-Mexico border by sending them back to the countries from which they came and passed through. Immigrant advocates argue that doing so could have deadly consequences.

Source: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/1/21/21075158/mexico-guatemala-border-crossing-honduran-migrants

The post Mexico is cracking down on another US-bound migrant caravan first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

TAPACHULA, Mexico (AP) — Hundreds of immigrants from Africa, the Caribbean and Central America were corralled and detained in southern Mexico on Sunday after a futile attempt to head north as part of a caravan aiming to reach the United States.

The group set out before sunrise Saturday from Tapachula, near the Guatemalan border, where many had been marooned for months trying to get transit visas. They carried heavy backpacks, babies, and parcels on their heads.

Just before dusk, after having trudged more than 20 miles north, they were surrounded by hundreds of National Guard agents and police who persuaded the exhausted marchers to board vans back to Tapachula. Children cried and women complained angrily about waiting months for papers. It was unclear if any would be deported.

The crackdown on the caravan, many of whose members were of African descent, underlined the sharp reversal from Mexico’s immigration policy a year ago, when officials looked the other way as caravans headed toward the United States. But under pressure from Washington, the nominally liberal government of President Andrés López Obrador has been taking a tougher stance in dealing with immigrants, and many Mexicans are being less welcoming.

Salva Lacruz, from the Fray Matías de Córdova Human Rights Center in Tapachula, called the roundup a “human hunt” and said officials waited until the refuge-seekers had tired out before forcing them into vans.

Sending them back south was an “exercise in cruelty,” Lacruz said, saying the people have come to Mexico because “they need international protection.”

About half of the people in the caravan were black, including Haitians, estimated Lacruz, who accompanied the group.

Wilner Metelus, a Mexican activist who was born in Haiti, described the government’s behavior toward Africans and their descendants as “shameful.”

“Today the Afro-descendants are alone,” he said.

“Migrants of African descent don’t represent a threat to Mexicans. Many of them are highly educated and could offer a lot to the country,” Metelus said.

Despite its birth as a mestizo culture under the Spanish conquest, racial prejudice against indigenous and dark-skinned people is rampant in Mexico.

The National Migration Institute said in a statement Saturday that each member of the caravan “will be treated in a personalized manner” and that some will be returned to their countries of origin.

The situation in Mexico has changed dramatically since a caravan set out exactly a year ago from San Pedro Sula, Honduras. That group swelled at its height to 7,000 people, who banded together to find safety in numbers as they trudged through Guatemala and then Mexico in an attempt to reach the United States.

Mexican townspeople greeted that caravan with fruit, tortillas, and water, and mayors cleared space for the large group to sleep in town squares. Some cities received the caravan with live music.

The caravans’ passage north earned Mexican officials the ire of U.S. President Donald Trump, who threatened to close the U.S.-Mexico border if Mexico failed to stop the flow of migrants.

Mexico’s export-driven economy is highly dependent on commerce with the United States, and the government has become far less hospitable to refuge-seekers. In June, officials broke up a large caravan, pulled people heading north from trains and detained two immigrant advocates for questioning. Immigrants have received less help from townspeople, while governments in Central America have agreed to work to slow the tide of immigration.

“It seems like there is increased enforcement across the region in response to U.S. pressure,” said Maureen Meyer, director for Mexico and immigrant rights at the Washington Office on Latin America.

Emigrants from conflict-wracked African countries set their sights on the Americas after doors began to shut in Europe. A typical journey from Africa involves a flight to Brazil, which has been amenable to granting visas, followed by a long and perilous trip north. The worst patch, many Africans say, is the trek through Panama’s Darien Gap, a dense tropical forest inhabited by venomous snakes and ruthless robbers.

Southern Mexico has become a frustrating way station for thousands of Africans, most of whom would prefer to start anew in the United States or Canada because of language and cultural barriers in Mexico.

“These are individuals that have gone through numerous horrors both in their home countries and then on their journey,” Meyer said.

Most of the Haitians arriving at Mexico’s southern border have lived in South America for several years after some nations granted them protected immigration status. Now such policies are less favorable, propelling the Haitians to seek a new home as their country is mired in an intense political crisis. Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.

Mexico has offered refugees the possibility of obtaining work and residency permits to stay in southern Mexico, far from the U.S. border. But those asylum permits are slow coming in an overstretched immigration system. Also, southern Mexico is the country’s poorest region, so job opportunities there are scarce.

Hundreds of Africans stranded in Tapachula opted against joining the caravan on Saturday and continue to bide their time on the streets.

Joseph Pele Meza, a father of two from Congo, said it’s important to respect Mexican laws and wait for a permit to head north.

“Here I am waiting calmly,” he said Sunday. “We just ask the authorities to open their hearts, to open the doors to give us documents.”

(Courthouse News contributed to this report.)

Source: https://www.courthousenews.com/mexico-locks-up-hundreds-of-refugees-headed-north/

The post Mexico Locks up Hundreds of Refugees Headed North first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Photo by: Gregory Bull    In this Jan. 16, 2019, image, a man uses a ladder to climb an electrical pole in a border neighborhood in Tijuana, Mexico, alongside a newly-replaced section of the border wall. The U.S. faces a delicate dance as it charts a course to extend or replace border barriers near homes and structures. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)

Illegal immigration across the southwest border is on pace for the worst year since 2007 — or the last time the country began a massive wall-building spree — according to new Homeland Security numbers.

Four months into the fiscal year the Border Patrol nabbed nearly 201,500 people, compared to about 109,500 at the same point in the previous year. If that 84 percent surge holds, it works out to 733,000 immigrants crossing illegally for fiscal year 2019, which would be by far the highest numbers in more than a decade.

And the new surge is comprised of migrant families and children, which are a much tougher population to combat, thanks to U.S. policies imposed by Congress and the courts that make it tougher to deport them.

“Family units and unaccompanied children from Central America are crossing the border illegally in greater numbers and in larger groups than ever before, straining our law enforcement resources,” said Brian Hastings, U.S. Border Patrol Chief of Operations. “These trends are very concerning and demonstrate the reality of the ongoing humanitarian and border security crisis.”

The number of families nabbed through the first four months of fiscal year 2019 is up 290 percent compared to the same point in 2018, authorities said, with mini-caravans of hundreds of people now a regular occurrence.

Late last week in Arizona, agents spotted a group of 325 people who’d jumped the border in remote desert country west of Lukeville.

That’s an area where there’s no border wall, but rather low-slung metal poles and crossbars that are meant to stop vehicles. They are easy for someone on foot to step over or crawl under.

Of the 325, 150 were children — and 32 of them unaccompanied, meaning they were traveling without their parents.

It took agents several hours to do an initial health screen, then pack the migrants into vans and take them to take them to a staging area where they could be picked up by buses and taken to a Border Patrol facility for processing.

During the medical screen, two children were deemed to need immediate medical attention: One 5-year-old had chicken pox, and a 12-year-old had a skin infection.

Members of the mini-caravan said they’d been dropped off by buses and trucks that used Mexican Federal Highway 2, a high-speed road that runs a parallel track just 50 yards south of the border, to deliver them. They massed, then crossed as a group at 8 a.m. on Thursday, and sat to wait for agents to find them.

A day later and several hundred miles to the east, agents arrested 290 people in a mini-caravan near Antelope Wells, New Mexico.

A border official told reporters large groups are often used as distractions by the cartels, who control both the human and drug trafficking traffic across the border, planning where each type of cargo will cross.

The cartels will send a large group over, knowing it will absorb an entire area’s contingent of agents, — then send a shipment of drugs across the border in a nearby location, confident that the agents are occupied feeding or performing medical checks on the migrants and won’t be able to respond.

“They’re using these large groups to facilitate the crossing of narcotics because they know they’ve tied up a large percentage of our manpower,” the Customs and Border Protection official said, briefing reporters Friday on the latest numbers and tactics.

On any day, about 150 Border Patrol agents are pulled out of the field and have to do “hospital watch,” staying with hundreds of migrants who were so sick when they arrived that they needed immediate medical attention, officials said.

Chicken pox, measles, mumps and other infectious diseases are common.

Through the first four months of fiscal year 19, Homeland Security had seen 60 large groups — defined as at least 100 migrants. In 2018, the number was just 13. And in 2017 it was just one.

Thursday’s group of 325 came in February, too late for the January statistics which officials released Friday.

Those stats showed the Border Patrol caught 47,893 immigrants trying to jump the border, and CBP officers encountered another 10,314 immigrants who showed up at official border crossings and entered without permission.

Of those nabbed at the border, 24,116 came as families and 5,124 were unaccompanied children.

The total number and the number of family members are both down a bit from December — but officials said they saw a surge in the final weeks of January, suggesting that the trend line is picking up again.

Arrests are considered a good approximation of the overall flow of people. More arrests likely mean more people are getting through.

At the turn of the century, the government was catching more than 1.5 million immigrants a year illegally crossing the border.

That remained at about 1 million a year through 2006, then dropped to about 850,000 in 2007, as the Bush administration deployed troops and began a massive round of fence-building. As those moves took hold, apprehensions dropped precipitously, to about 700,000 in 2008, 550,000 in 2009, and lower than 500,000 every year this decade.

The 733,000 the government is on track for this year would easily top that decade average.

The porous nature of American policy means those who are arrested are more likely to get a foothold in the U.S., despite their unlawful status.

Of the families and unaccompanied children nabbed in 2017, more than 98 percent of them were still in the U.S. as of late last year. Court rulings make it almost impossible to detain them, and once they’re released into communities they are difficult to roust, Homeland Security officials say.

Source: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/feb/10/illegal-immigration-mexico-border-pace-worst-2007/

The post Illegal immigration on pace for worst year since massive wall-building spree in 2007 first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The post BREAKING , Migrant caravan reaches town on Texas border first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Washington DC: The United States will send an additional 3,750 troops to its frontier with Mexico, the Pentagon said Sunday, as President Donald Trump doubled down on his call for a wall to boost border security.

Soldiers were originally deployed to the border under an order President Donald Trump gave before midterm elections in November as “caravans” of migrants made their way to the border to seek asylum from violence and poverty in their own countries.

But the mission, under which troops assist civilian border patrol agents by providing logistical support and installing concertina-wire fencing, has been described by opponents as a political stunt designed to create the illusion of a crisis.

“The Department of Defense will deploy approximately 3,750 additional US forces to provide the additional support to CBP (Customs and Border Protection) at the southwest border that Acting Secretary of Defense (Pat) Shanahan approved Jan. 11,” a statement said.

This additional deployment is for three months, the statement added, and will bring to 4,350 the total number of troops at the border. Their tasks will include “a mobile surveillance capability through the end of September 2019, as well as the emplacement of approximately 150 miles of concertina wire between ports of entry.”

The news comes ahead of a February 15 deadline that President Donald Trump set for Congress to agree on funding for building a border wall which he made a key pledge in his election campaign. The president says that existing sections of walls should be extended along the border to stop what he describes as an uncontrolled invasion of criminals.

Trump underscored these claims Sunday. “With Caravans marching through Mexico and toward our Country, Republicans must be prepared to do whatever is necessary for STRONG Border Security,” he tweeted.

“Dems do nothing. If there is no Wall, there is no Security. Human Trafficking, Drugs and Criminals of all dimensions – KEEP OUT!” Democrats, who control the lower house, have repeatedly rejected Trump’s funding demands, saying that he has made the wall project a political crusade to demonize immigrants and to satisfy his base.

He previously tried to pressure Congress into backing his idea by refusing to sign off on budgets for swathes of the federal government, leading to a five-week shutdown of some 800,000 government jobs.

The border troop deployment was one of several issues on which Trump and former defense secretary Jim Mattis disagreed before he quit in December after Trump’s shock decision to pull troops from Syria.

Source: https://www.timesnownews.com/international/article/us-sends-3750-more-troops-to-mexico-border-pentagon/359866

The post US sends 3,750 more troops to Mexico border: Pentagon first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The caravan left the northern city of San Pedro Sula earlier than expected. There was chatter on social media that the group would leave at 5 a.m. on Tuesday. It is unclear why the group left earlier, but rainy weather could have played a role.

The scene was a familiar one: The group had a mix of people that included some mothers carrying their young children on their shoulders. It’s unclear where the group will rest, but past migrants have used the Honduran city of Quimistan, which is 35 miles from the bus stop, as an early checkpoint.

As they walked, some migrants pleaded with local store owners to give them food or water for their journey, according to the Associated Press.

One woman, who refused to give her name because of safety concerns, told the AP that her 9-year-old daughter had already been raped so badly she suffered medical problems.

She said she would ask U.S. authorities for asylum or refugee status, “because it’s not possible to live in Honduras anymore.”

President Trump last week mentioned the new caravan and said, “we’re trying to break it up,” according to The New York Times.

He said a “drone isn’t going to stop it and a sensor isn’t going to stop it, but you know what’s going to stop it in its tracks? A nice, powerful wall.”

Fox News’ Dan Gallo contributed to this report from Honduras

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/world/new-migrant-caravan-leaves-honduras-for-journey-to-us-border

The post New migrant caravan leaves Honduras for journey to US border first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

As the Trump administration has sparred with federal judges in its efforts to stop illegal border crossings, those wanting to come to America have been paying attention. Illegal crossings at the US southern border have spiked recently, with border patrol agents picking up nearly 2,000 people a day trying to enter from Mexico.

While the migrant caravan making its way north may have dwindled somewhat in numbers, more groups are coming along behind.

US Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleenan said, “We are already facing a border security and humanitarian crisis along our southwest border. Each day on average for the last three weeks CBP has encountered a combination of almost 1,900 persons apprehended crossing our border illegally or presenting without documents at ports of entry.”

“They are incentivized to try to cross…by the expectation that they will be allowed to stay,” he continued. “There are tens of thousands of migrants between the Guatemala border and the US border moving toward us at any given time.  Within that flow and included are about 17,000 criminals last year along with hardened smugglers and people from over 100 different countries around the world.”

Border patrol is bringing in all resources from extra agents to helicopters to special operations and medical teams to deal with this crisis. When you add the active duty troops and National Guard units heading here to provide support, there will soon be more assets guarding our southern frontier than currently serving in Afghanistan or Iraq.

One Honduran man traveling with the caravan told us they are coming in, no matter what they may face.

“We’ve decided if we’re going to die, we are going to die together. We are going to make it or die trying,” he said.

If they repeat the performance made on the Guatemala-Mexico border, one group of soldiers from Fort Carson, Colorado stands ready to disrupt their plans.

PV2 Robert Marschewski, 4th Engineer Battalion, Fort Carson, Colorado told CBN News, “As a combat engineer we are highly trained in obstacles, which will be very useful right now. It’s just another way to support my country, and do what needs to be done.”

The new border wall is going up very slowly in Texas and California, and its progress could be significantly affected depending on the outcome of next week’s elections. In the meantime, these troops will fill in the gaps and form a human wall to help border agents handle the crisis along our 2,000-mile southern border.

Source: https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/national-security/2018/november/pre-caravan-border-stats-are-staggering-17-000-criminals-100-countries-1-900-caught-each-day

The post Pre-Caravan Border Stats Are Staggering: 17,000 Criminals, 100 Countries, 1,900 Caught Each Day first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Interior Secretary Sánchez: preparing for another caravan.

The federal government is reinforcing the southern border after hearing reports that a new caravan of migrants is set to leave Central America by mid-January, intending to travel north through Mexico to the United States.

Interior Secretary Olga Sánchez Cordero explained that measures are under way to guarantee that the migrants’ entry into Mexico is safe, orderly and regulated.

The 12 established entry points at the southern border are to be reinforced, she continued, as will the surveillance of 379 illegal crossings that have been detected.

The federal government’s new migrant policy establishes several requirements for migrants, such as providing personal information that includes biometric data, the reason for their entry and official identification, Sánchez said.

Anyone who fails to comply will be deported.

All requests for entry are to be processed within 72 hours, and should conclude with the issuing of either work permits or humanitarian visas.

Undersecretary for human rights Alejandro Encinas Rodríguez said migrants who want to cross Mexico to reach the United States must have a visa issued by that country or they will not be allowed in.

Source: Multimedios (sp)

Source: https://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/another-migrants-caravan-sets-out/

The post Mexico to reinforce southern border as another migrants’ caravan sets out first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

The post Tucker and Tijuana delegate blast migrant caravan first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.