We’re failing our responsibilities as a nation of immigrants

The tragic mess at the U.S./Mexico border is complicated enough that people can see in it what they want — a mob climbing walls and throwing rocks, or desperate parents choking on tear gas thrown by U.S. border-patrol agents.

Both are true and both are unfortunate, but they are only two elements of a much bigger picture. Managing the flow of migrants is going to require progress on very different fronts, some of which the U.S. can’t control.

Migration from Latin America always has been driven mainly by economic need — the desire to build a better life for one’s family. If economic conditions in Latin America improved enough, immigration problems likely would end overnight.

More recently, greater political instability, crime and violence, especially in Central America, have added to the desperation. Honduras, where the current “caravan” originated, is plagued by murderous gangs. A recent disputed election sparked further unrest.

It also reportedly fueled the growth of the caravan. After the journey began more or less spontaneously with about 120 people in the Honduran town of San Pedro Sula, especially beset by gangs, activists opposed to Honduras’ president urged others to join, intending it as a dramatic demonstration of how the government is failing its people.

A Honduran television broadcast that falsely suggested that backers were paying for buses for the migrants sparked hundreds more to join overnight, and it grew to thousands.

Fixing Latin America’s problems, old and new, is an enormous challenge, but it isn’t one the U.S. can afford to ignore. As long as conditions south of the border remain unlivable, people will be drawn to the U.S.

As long as those problems persist, the question remains how the U.S. will respond. The policies and procedures of recent decades aren’t adequate anymore. Not because more migrants are coming; the numbers actually are down significantly from 10 and 20 years ago. But because of Central America’s problems, migrants are more likely to be families with children.

That makes it more complicated to detain and deport them and means that more are likely to seek asylum. And that, combined with President Donald Trump’s ugly inclination to rally his fans by demonizing immigrants, has led to horrific outcomes such as children forcibly separated from parents and barefoot mothers and children fleeing tear gas.

We hope those images can prompt Republicans and Democrats in Congress to finally work toward a humane and responsible overhaul of immigration policy, a duty that has been ignored during partisan deadlock.

No policy should be based on Trump’s hateful rhetoric, which consists largely of lies such as the caravan includes many “stone-cold criminals” and was guided by American Democrats. He has inflamed an already difficult situation, heedless of how many innocent people are hurt.

The U.S. shouldn’t be expected to open its borders to every impoverished migrant in the hemisphere. But every civilized nation should be willing to accept and welcome, within reasonable terms, refugees and those who want to work and contribute. In a nation as fortunate and indebted to immigrants as ours, the moral obligation is greater.

Those who can’t be allowed in should be dealt with humanely and without unreasonable delay. Tangled policy and inadequate resources at the border leave the U.S. utterly unable to do that.

America can do better.