The Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration began as soon as Trump took office. It clearly has not worked. Instead it has caused misery and strife.
Trumpeting across the Americas that you are not welcome here, and if you cross our border illegally we will separate your families, lock up your children, deport you without them has produced no gains except in the accounts of private contractors and corporations operating detention centers.
Trump's vitriolic threats have not stopped refugees and asylum seekers fleeing violence and poverty en masse. The caravans of thousands currently walking through Guatemala and Mexico are fleeing combinations of poverty, extortion, and life-threatening gang, cartel, and militia violence.
What began as one group of 160 people leaving the city of San Pedro Sula on the northeastern coast of Honduras, grew rapidly within a few weeks, into multiple caravans of thousands from the Northern Triangle of Central America—Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and now Mexico.
Trumpeting across the Americas that you are not welcome here, and if you cross our border illegally we will separate your families, lock up your children, deport you without them has produced no gains except in the accounts of private contractors and corporations operating detention centers.
Trump's vitriolic threats have not stopped refugees and asylum seekers fleeing violence and poverty en masse. The caravans of thousands currently walking through Guatemala and Mexico are fleeing combinations of poverty, extortion, and life-threatening gang, cartel, and militia violence.
What began as one group of 160 people leaving the city of San Pedro Sula on the northeastern coast of Honduras, grew rapidly within a few weeks, into multiple caravans of thousands from the Northern Triangle of Central America—Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and now Mexico.
We've heard Trump make a lot of false claims in his short tenure in office. He has been called a pathological liar, he lies so frequently. So it is not surprising he has claimed without any supporting evidence that these caravans of refugees have been orchestrated, or that they have been infiltrated by criminal elements, including terrorists. Actually, at this time there is spotty evidence of any
kind as to the makeup of these caravans.
What we do know is that over the past ten years distinctions between asylum seekers and economic migrants have become increasingly muddled, that there is now significant overlap, and that laws, both international and U.S. laws, have not kept up with addressing these changes. Of course, now Trump is blaming the inadequacy of immigration laws on Democrats. But Democrats are not solely to blame, and even if they were, immigration law would not solve the problems causing mass migration. Why do people leave home, parents, relatives, safety? Because there is no safety where they live. Really think what it means to leave your parents, your grandparents, your relatives and flee for your lives knowing you might not survive the flight. There is one way to prevent mass migrations of this kind, and that is to stop contributing to the destabilization of countries and start helping instead.
What we do know is that over the past ten years distinctions between asylum seekers and economic migrants have become increasingly muddled, that there is now significant overlap, and that laws, both international and U.S. laws, have not kept up with addressing these changes. Of course, now Trump is blaming the inadequacy of immigration laws on Democrats. But Democrats are not solely to blame, and even if they were, immigration law would not solve the problems causing mass migration. Why do people leave home, parents, relatives, safety? Because there is no safety where they live. Really think what it means to leave your parents, your grandparents, your relatives and flee for your lives knowing you might not survive the flight. There is one way to prevent mass migrations of this kind, and that is to stop contributing to the destabilization of countries and start helping instead.
Trump’s isolationist policies and in particular his threats to revoke financial support from countries dependent on aid are not helping them or us. His nationalism may well be effecting the opposite of safeguarding our borders. People everywhere need at least a minimal standard of living, opportunities to work, basic necessities, school for their children, and safety and security. The Northern Triangle countries depend on relationships with bigger, wealthier countries for their own stability. Why is it so hard to defeat the criminal activity of cartels, gangs, and militia involved in extortion, drug and human trafficking and afford people a minimal standard of living? In a few words: corruption at every level.
I know and acknowledge these issues are extremely complex. The solutions to these problems are complicated and difficult. But basic human greed, the ambition to exert power and control to exploit and extort resources and people strikes me as antithetical to any possibility of higher human instincts of caring, compassion, and striving toward understanding and civility. I firmly believe Trump's isolationist nationalist rhetoric and his revocation of aid to impoverished countries struggling with internal insecurity of their populations is only contributing to the problem of mass migration we're seeing happen now.
When countries become increasingly destabilized, whether or not destabilization originated in other more powerful countries mucking around in their political and economic affairs, people are going to suffer and become so desperate they will flee poverty and danger even if it means attempting to walk thousands of miles to get to what they perceive, possibly wrongly, as a better place. People are risking their lives and their children's lives because they are convinced there is no place worse than that place they have left, even the United States where Trump is broadcasting to them and to the world that they are not wanted.
And yet they come. Just think of it.
Emily Kretschmer
October 24, 2018
This blog post was in both a general and specific sense informed by "The migrant caravan, explained," by Dara Lind. VOX. October 24, 2018
When countries become increasingly destabilized, whether or not destabilization originated in other more powerful countries mucking around in their political and economic affairs, people are going to suffer and become so desperate they will flee poverty and danger even if it means attempting to walk thousands of miles to get to what they perceive, possibly wrongly, as a better place. People are risking their lives and their children's lives because they are convinced there is no place worse than that place they have left, even the United States where Trump is broadcasting to them and to the world that they are not wanted.
And yet they come. Just think of it.
Emily Kretschmer
October 24, 2018
This blog post was in both a general and specific sense informed by "The migrant caravan, explained," by Dara Lind. VOX. October 24, 2018
and the educational resource The Center for Civic Education, 2018