They’re here!
The first wave of the massive migrant caravan arrived in Tijuana at the US-Mexico border Tuesday morning. Some 350 people rolled up in busses with at least 5,000 more on the way.
From the Desert Sun:
The first large wave of the migrant caravan arrived in Tijuana early Tuesday morning. About 350 migrants, mostly from Central America, rolled into the border city on nine buses. Some hung out of bus windows and cheered; at least one Honduran flag fluttered outside a window.The migrants are reaching their final destination in Mexico amid inflamed tensions on both sides of the California-Mexico border. At the El Chaparral port of entry earlier Tuesday morning, people who have been waiting weeks to claim asylum said many migrant shelters along the border are at capacity. They expressed concern that the caravan would jeopardize their chances of entering the United States.Meanwhile, U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced it was closing some northbound vehicle lanes at the San Ysidro and Otay Mesa border crossings to prepare for the arrival of “thousands of people migrating in a caravan” toward the border. The agency said Department of Defense personnel were installing concertina wire and erecting barriers, barricades and fencing.The migrants left San Pedro Sula, Honduras about a month ago, fleeing poverty, gang violence and lawlessness. The group — which at its peak included some 7,000 people according to estimates by United Nations officials — has trekked through heat and hitched harrowing rides on the sides of trucks and tractor trailers. By the time the caravan reached Mexico City in early November, the caravan had shrunk to about 5,000. The group rested in a stadium in Mexico’s capital before leaving late last week to finish the journey to Tijuana.The group that arrived Tuesday morning follows a smaller contingent of about 85 migrants, most members of the LGBT community, that peeled off from the caravan and arrived in an upscale Tijuana neighborhood on Sunday night. They were confronted by residents, who said they opposed the migrants’ presence in the area, according to local news reports.
Last week, the President and CNN’s Jim Acosta got into a heated spat over the migrant caravan, the spat that ultimately led to the White House revoking Acosta’s press pass. Trump and Acosta sparred over the use of “invasion” to describe the caravan. “They’re hundreds and hundreds of miles away. That’s not an invasion,” Acosta insisted.
In anticipation of the massive influx migrants, the Trump administration recently updated the rules governing asylum status. Meant to encourage asylum-seekers to request legal status at a port of entry, those who enter the country illegally and then request asylum status will face an uphill battle having asylum status granted.
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