‘This is what makes us fearful’: Migrant caravan hoofs it toward southern border as Election Day nears

A migrant caravan is heading northward toward the United States a few weeks before Election Day, the results of which will almost undoubtedly spell changes for border enforcement policies, according to The Associated Press.

A roughly 2,000-person strong migrant caravan left southern Mexico on Sunday in hopes of reaching the U.S. in the coming days, according to the AP. The latest caravan is so far the largest since newly-elected Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum entered office in October.

Among those in the caravan are individuals who expressed concern that a new administration in Washington, D.C., would lead to the end of a popular app that has allowed hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals to schedule appointments with Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials in hopes of entering the country.

“That is what makes us fearful,” Joel Zambrano, a Venezuelan national, said to the Associated Press. “They say this could change because they could both close the CBP One appointment and all the services that are helping migrants.”

🛑BREAKING- Massive 2500 Migrant caravan leaving the south border of Mexico, and their intention to make it to the borders of the United States of America. This will be the third caravan that has been created under the new administration of the new president of Mexico. An… pic.twitter.com/UjtFyHefVq

— Oscar El Blue (@Oscarelblue) October 20, 2024

The CBP One app was first created in October 2020, with the Biden-Harris administration dramatically expanding its use in January 2023. The popular app enables migrants to schedule appointments in order to obtain exemptions at ports of entry and permits them to submit biometric data to federal immigration authorities in order to apply for travel authorization and obtain parole.

More than 800,000 non-citizens scheduled appointments through the CBP One app from January 2023 through the end of August 2024, according to CBP. The Biden-Harris administration has additionally flown in more than half a million foreign nationals into the country via an initiative known as CHNV — a program that grants two-year parole to Cuban, Haitian, Nicaraguan, and Venezuelan nationals.

Roughly 7.4 million migrants have illegally crossed the U.S.-Mexico border since the beginning of the Biden-Harris administration, according to the latest data from CBP.

While the CBP One app and an election-year crackdown on illegal immigration by the Mexican government have helped keep migrants in southern Mexico, many are reportedly leaving the region due to a delay in asylum appointments and a lack of job opportunities.

“The situation in my country is very bad, the president doesn’t do anything for us. We spent a week by the border, but getting documents takes time,” Honduran Roberto Domínguez said to the Associated Press. “The documents we get are only for us to be in Tapachula and we cannot leave the city.”

Despite an attempt to brand herself as more of a border hawk since launching her presidential campaign, Vice President Kamala Harris has consistently polled poorly with voters on border enforcement issues following her administration’s oversight of a historical border crisis. Former President Donald Trump, for his part, has pledged to hire 10,000 Border Patrol agents, give them a 10% pay bump, and wage a large-scale deportation effort.

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