Pressure turns to Mexico border
GUATEMALA CITY — As some 3,000 Hondurans made their way through Guatemala, attention — and pressure — turned to Mexico, after U.S. President Donald Trump threatened Thursday to close the U.S.-Mexico border if authorities there fail to stop them — a nearly unthinkable move that would disrupt hundreds of thousands of legal freight, vehicle and pedestrian crossings each day.
With less than three weeks before the Nov. 6 midterm elections, Trump seized on the migrant caravan to make border security a political issue and energize his Republican base.
“I must, in the strongest of terms, ask Mexico to stop this onslaught — and if unable to do so I will call up the U.S. Military and CLOSE OUR SOUTHERN BORDER!” Trump tweeted on Thursday, adding that he blamed Democrats for what he called “weak laws!”
The threat followed another one earlier this week to cut off aid to Central American countries if the migrants weren’t stopped. However, earlier this year Trump made a similar vow over another large migrant caravan, but didn’t follow through and it largely petered out in Mexico.
On Thursday, Mexico dispatched additional police to its southern border, after the Casa del Migrante shelter on the Guatemalan side of the border reported that hundreds of Hondurans had already arrived there.
Mexican officials say the Hondurans won’t be allowed to enter as a group, and would either have to show a passport and visa — something few have — or apply individually for refugee status, a process that can mean waiting for up to 90 days for approval.
Mexico’s ambassador to Guatemala, Luis Manuel Lopez Moreno, met with leaders of the caravan Wednesday and warned them that Hondurans caught without papers in Mexico would be deported.
Still, the idea Mexico could close its porous southern border — or that the United States would choke off the lucrative trade and other traffic between the two nations — strained the imagination.
Mexican Presidentelect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who takes office on Dec. 1, wants to avoid repression against migrants and also avoid angering the United States. He has long pushed economic development as a way to keep people from migrating.