Hundreds-strong migrant caravan stalls at southern Mexican border

A massive caravan of mostly Honduran migrants stalled Friday and Saturday at Mexico's southern border while trying to make their way to the United States.

Mexican authorities have said those who meet entry requirements, like holding a visa, will be allowed through, but so far only a trickle — many women and children — have made it past the bridge checkpoint over the Suchiate River where hundreds waited overnight.

Police in riot gear have used tear gas and smoke to control the crowd. Those permitted to apply for refugee status can stay in a shelter, but conditions on the bridge are rapidly becoming unsanitary.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

President Trump has threatened to close the southern border to keep the migrants out, but he agreed Thursday night to evaluate their asylum claims. At a rally in Arizona Friday evening, Trump alleged "many of those people [in the caravan] — a fairly big percentage of those people — are criminals."

The group includes young children and pregnant women seeking to escape dire economic circumstances and even violence in their home countries. "We have suffered so much," one migrant mother on the bridge told CBS News. "She has a fever and we brought nothing," she added, gesturing to her baby.