I’ve been reliably told that Kamala is going to crack down on the border now
‘If Trump wins I’m never going’: The 2,000-strong migrant army rushing to the US
They had walked through the night while it was cool, their spirits – despite the odds stacked against them – still high. A ragtag army of 2,000 migrants travelling by foot and in convoy, trying to reach the United States before the possible return of Donald Trump to the White House.
As the sun came up on Thursday morning, the migrants had managed 90 miles in the five days since setting out from Tapachula, the main city on Mexico’s southern border with Guatemala. They only have another 1,000 miles to go to arrive at their promised land: Mexico’s northern border. One of the caravan’s organiser’s calls it “their exodus”; it could almost be a pilgrimage.
The prospect of a Trump presidency – and with it even tougher border restrictions – has galvanised them to start walking now.
A second convoy will set off on Nov 5, deliberately timed for election day, “so Joe Biden and Kamala Harris know we are heading their way” in an effort by human rights activists to emphasise their plight.
But, but, but, they’re supposed to be turned away as Biden-Harris instituted remain in Mexico, right?
Fed up waiting for the all-important asylum meeting date and with the election looming, Ms Meza hit the road with the convoy on Sunday trying to reach the northern border. “We were waiting for the [asylum] appointment but then with the election all these applications will be closed and we are running out of time. The applications are being paused or cancelled but the border will be open,” she says, her three-year-old daughter Taisha pulling at her for attention, “If Donald Trump gets in office again, it will be much tougher.”
I suspect if Trump wins the Biden-Harris regime will end all the border restrictions they enacted as election season hit, leaving the border open and bring in who knows how many illegals/migrants, most of whom won’t be eligible for asylum. How many gang members? How many murderers and rapists? And then most likely ship them to areas which voted Trump in the dead of night.
Rohmal Silva, 38, from Guatemala, is trying desperately to get back to the US, where he has two teenage children. He was deported in 2018 – he says for a drunk driving conviction – after a year in jail and is now on the convoy making the march north. “If Donald Trump wins I think I am never going to go back,” he says, “I am trying to get back before the inauguration. I left Guatemala two weeks ago. I could see the election was coming.”
Mr Silva, who moved to Boston aged 13, is stuck in a no-man’s land, partly of his own doing. “I make a mistake. I got deported. I am trying to go back. I really miss my children. I worry about Donald Trump because the law is going to change a lot and it is going to be more hard to go back to the United States. It is hard now but at least you can apply and apply and you can get somewhere. I need a second chance. I am a father and I don’t think it’s fair that my children are there growing up without a father.”
He knew the rules. He could bring his kids out of the Boston area and to Guatemala.
But he, like the others, is in a race. “At this point our future is not certain. I would like to arrive before Donald Trump [wins]. He will make coming into the country more complicated. That is what everybody is afraid of.”
If they do not want to be afraid of that, there’s an answer: do not come.
