October 21, 2018

Watch 5,000 Central American Migrants Walk to the United States

The caravan left the southern Mexico border on Sunday and headed north.

Central American migrants head for the United States. Ivan Sanchez/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images

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On Sunday, thousands of Central American migrants left Mexico’s southern border and marched north as they made their way to the United States to seek asylum. The caravan, which has drawn the ire of President Donald Trump, began in Honduras on October 13 when roughly 3,000 migrants left the town of San Pedro Sula. By Sunday morning, their numbers had reached at least 5,000. 

Thousands used rafts to illegally cross the Suchiate River that borders Guatemala and Mexico on their trek before eventually re-forming with the mass migration. At one point on Saturday, Mexican officials blocked a group of 1,000 migrants trying to enter the country’s southern border. 

This spring, a caravan organized by the migrant advocacy and support group Pueblos Sin Fronteras (People Without Borders), made a similar trek.

Trump has seized on the caravan in campaign rallies this week, calling the migrants “very bad people,” blaming Democrats for the migration, requesting Mexican officials stop the migrants in their tracks, and threatening to shut down the US-Mexico border.

“These are some bad people coming through. These aren’t babies, these aren’t little angels coming into our country,” Trump said on Friday at the White House.

In fact, many of the migrants are small children. Here’s a look at the group’s journey.

HERE ARE THE FACTS:

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As we wrote over the summer, traffic has been down at Mother Jones and a lot of sites with many people thinking news is less important now that Donald Trump is no longer president. But if you're reading this, you're not one of those people, and we're hoping we can rally support from folks like you who really get why our reporting matters right now. And that's how it's always worked: For 45 years now, a relatively small group of readers (compared to everyone we reach) who pitch in from time to time has allowed Mother Jones to do the type of journalism the moment demands and keep it free for everyone else.

Please pitch in with a donation during our fall fundraising drive if you can. We can't afford to come up short, and there's still a long way to go by November 5.

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