Mexico: A Land Of Waiting

CENTRAL AMERICA

A Land of Waiting

Wearing his red and white “Make Tijuana Great Again” hat, Mayor Juan Manuel Gastélum recently described Central American migrants as “pot smokers, bums and bad people,” according to Fox News.

He has refused to apologize for his incendiary remarks and has appealed a Mexican court ruling barring him from making more derogatory comments about migrants, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.

The “Trump of Tijuana,” as Slate called him, has made his stance on the thousands of migrants who have stopped in his city on their way to the United States a major plank in his re-election bid.

The subject is probably a better talking point on the campaign trail than the 2,009 homicides that San Diego’s local NBC affiliate saidoccurred in the border town last year, an increase from around 1,650 in 2017.

In a sense, the migrants’ presence has stimulated crime and corruption in Mexico, USA Today reported. Turned away at the border, they desperately scrounge up around $5,000 per person to pay smugglers to bring them into the US illegally while avoiding criminal gangs who might kidnap and ransom them.

The American policy of “Remain in Mexico” – currently applied only at the San Ysidro border crossing between Tijuana and San Diego – sends Central American asylum seekers back to the Mexican city to stay as authorities decide their applications. The policy, officially called the Migration Protection Protocols, could make the crisis south of the border worse as more people arrive, Al Jazeera argued.

The problem is already ballooning in Piedras Negras, a Mexican town across the Rio Grande from Eagle Pass, Texas. Customs and Border Protection officials can only process 20 people a day from Piedras Negras, NBC News reported. A total of 1,800 asylum seekers are sleeping in a shelter as they await processing.

Maverick County Sheriff Tom Schmerber recently visited the shelter. He and others were readying for any potential breakdowns in public safety, in case the migrants in the shelter grow restive.

Last month, signaling a commitment to migrants’ rights, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador offered humanitarian visas to citizens from crime-ridden Central American countries like El Salvador and Honduras, allowing them to travel and work around Mexico.

A caravan of 12,000 Central Americans set out for Mexico soon after the open-door policy was announced. The government responded by shuttering the program, noted United Press International.

Now, many migrants feel as if the US and Mexico are “playing with their lives,” wrote PRI.

While some migrants are confused or shocked over the new and sometimes-flip-flopping policies, most understand they will be waiting, and waiting, and waiting.

“We obviously would rather be in the United States and waiting, but if we have to wait, we will,” a Salvadoran named Juli, 24, told PRI. “The gangs threatened us, and all five of us living in the house left within a day. What’s our alternative?”