There's another large caravan of migrants moving through Mexico, heading for the U.S. border. Between 6,000 and 7,000 people are filling the dusty roads of southern Mexico in a triumphant march for what they think is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
Let's be clear: These are not people escaping oppression. They aren't being persecuted for their political beliefs. They are not seeking asylum protection from the United States government because they are in danger of being killed or executed by their government
They are coming to the U.S. to escape poverty. While this is an admirable goal — the goal of immigrants throughout American history — it is not a legal basis for asylum.
Tell that to Luis Garcia Villagran, a self-proclaimed Evangelical Christian and radical, who has been leading these caravans across Mexico for several years. He says that by the time they reach the border, this caravan will have 15,000 people marching.
“We try to help people least protected, especially women and child migrants,” the media-savvy frontman told The Daily Caller in a July 2022 interview. “Simply, we apply what is in the law.”
Migrant caravan moves through Mexico towards US border pic.twitter.com/oePeDFjAGE
— RT (@RT_com) December 25, 2023
All he has to do is stop letting them in, stop paying them with our social security, stop aiding them with the App, stop giving them phones and a $5000 gift card. On the our dime. Biden can stop the migrant caravan heading to the border — if he cared https://t.co/1JiWbuFoUF
— Margaret Auburn Grad 1776 (@MargaretAUGrad) December 26, 2023
“Today we are the poorest of the poorest of those who are at the peak of need, those of us who do not have money to pay for visas or polleros,” said Villagrán, a migrant, referring to human smugglers.
Thousands join migrant caravan in Mexico ahead of Secretary of State Blinken's visit to the capital https://t.co/IgdBMSOiIg
— The Associated Press (@AP) December 25, 2023
These migrants appear to have more children with them than other groups that have crossed the border. Naturally, the kids wanted to know what happened to Christmas.
“They don’t understand why we have to do this to get a better life,” Amaya said. Nor did the governments of Mexico and the United States, she said.
“Why can’t they help us? We need their help,” she said.
Related: Madness: Migrants Rush the Border From Arizona to Texas
There are 700 million people around the world who live in extreme poverty, subsisting on about $2 a day. They need help, too. Why help people whose only claim to assistance is proximity to America?
The Christmas Eve caravan departed from the city of Tapachula, near the country’s southern border with Guatemala. Security forces looked on in what appeared to be a repeat of past tactics when authorities waited for the marchers to tire out and then offered them a form of temporary legal status that is used by many to continue their journey northward.
“We’ve been waiting here for three or four months without an answer,” said Cristian Rivera, traveling alone, having left his wife and child in his native Honduras. “Hopefully with this march there will be a change and we can get the permission we need to head north.”
Congress and the White House are very close to a deal that would radically change our asylum policies. It's not going to solve the problem of unfettered migration, but it would be a good beginning to slow the pipeline of illegals coming from south of the border.
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