The difference between President Donald Trump and President-elect Joe Biden on the immigration front can only be summed up as a the difference between night and day. Trump spent four years securing the southern U.S. border and correcting Barack Obama’s horrendous, open-borders policies.
Now that Biden is set to enter his first term in the White House in a matter of days, there are already multiple reports of large caravans forming, likely with the intention of heading to the border in order to seek shelter in the U.S. as Biden has promised to undo all of Trump’s immigration policies.
Apparently, Guatemala is ready to take action, as they’ve authorized the use of force to break up the caravans, if need be.
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Reuters has the story:
Guatemala declared emergency powers on Thursday as the first groups of migrants headed toward its border ahead of a larger caravan scheduled to depart Honduras on Friday morning bound for the United States.
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This week’s caravan would be the first of the year and comes six days before U.S. President-elect Joe Biden takes office on Wednesday.
Guatemala’s “State of Prevention” limits public demonstrations and allows authorities to disperse any public meeting, group or demonstration by force.
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It will be in effect for 15 days in seven of the Guatemalan provinces that migrants normally travel through en route to the Mexican border.
Honduran and Guatemalan authorities have also announced they will deploy thousands of soldiers to stop migrants.
On online forums, Central Americans have discussed plans to flee to the United States as the region reels from economic crises, high rates of violence, and the devastating fallout of two major hurricanes that hit in November.
On Wednesday night, hundreds of migrants departed Honduras ahead of Friday’s scheduled caravan.
“We’re heading to the United States because it’s impossible to live in Honduras,” one man, who declined to give his name, told a local Honduran television station.
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“There are no jobs and no security,” he added, as he walked toward the Guatemala border with a child perched on his shoulders. (Reporting by Sofia Menchu in Guatemala and Gustavo Palencia in Honduras; editing by Jonathan Oatis)
Obviously, we’re not heartless — we understand that people who make the choice to flee their own country are in dire straits and desperate to seek safety. But the argument is that while it’s going to be a pain because of government read tape, immigrants who choose to flee to America need to do it the legal way, just like millions of others have in the past.
The sad truth is that a vast majority of these immigrants will ignore the rule of law and use any means necessary to cross the southern border into the United States, especially with pro-immigration Biden at the helm.
It looks like these migrants will have to face obstacles, like dealing with the possibility of being broken up by use of force, long before they have a chance to get to the United States.
