Just in time for Democrats arguing walls don't work: New caravan readies to roll in

Walls don't work, as the Democrats like to say. But get a load of how 'no walls' work, from a Washington Post report:

MEXICO CITY —Another migrant caravan is forming in Honduras, with plans to set out next week on a journey that will once again test the immigration policies of Mexico and the United States.

In much the way last year’s Central American caravan originated, a flier is circulating on Honduran social media. “We’re looking for refuge,” it says. “In Honduras, we are being killed.” It advertises a 5 a.m. departure on Jan. 15 from the northern city of San Pedro Sula.

The Mexican government says it is preparing for the group’s arrival.

 

Obviously, caravans, ever better organized and more frequent, are becoming 'a thing.' 

As miserable as the last migrant caravan was, leaving thousands holed up in Tijuana's rainy, wet, cold, mass-living campgrounds, with open toilet smells to inhale, lice and thieves to keep them company, the horror of having to eat, gadzooks, Mexican food, and actual protests from disgusted locals, it apparently has worked out well enough for the migrants who decided to not bother waiting for an asylum appointment, but decided to take advantage of the U.S.'s barely-there walls. Crossing illegally, without waiting, they made all the others feel like fools for not coming. And word gets around. Here are some examples:

A U.S. congresswoman led a group of them illegally across the border to make it to the states to claim asylum, so, some got in that way.

Others just ran in through the cracks in the border gates and got through to make their asylum claims, too.

A single mom who got a pity-picture from Reuters for storming the U.S. port of entry at Tijuana and getting tear-gassed, an image which some say was manipulated, well, she somehow got in ahead of the others, too.

Someone let that woman who insulted Mexican food and drew Tijuana protests into the states illegally, too, where she is dining in style in Dallas now -- and expects free health care.

Someone let a pregnant woman in illegally to give birth - and automatic U.S. citizenship - to a baby as a means of increasing the legal case for her own stay in the states.

Anyone left outside still waiting for their number to be called in Tijuana must wonder why they're doing that instead of just running through. The incentives, based in existing U.S. law, are pretty amazing.

A wall would stop that, at least to some extent, and make migrating legally a more attractive prospect. People are not stupid, and they weigh their best options. What the coming caravans, and their increased organizational muscle, are telling us, is that it makes more sense to migrate illegally than legally.

Obviously, the attractive nuisance of the unwalled U.S. still stands, at least for now. Combine that with the legal incentives to come illegally, and it's no surprise that the caravans -- many, many, caravans -- are coming.

If that's not a case for President Trump's wall, what is? How is the prospect of 15,000 people, or 80,000 people, or 500,000 people, (with criminals salted in), storming our border, not a crisis, as Trump has argued. 

The fact that caravans, of murky financing, are being organized and turned into an ongoing and ever more polished organized operation suggests that the funding and organization of leftist open border groups is there, and the lack of a wall makes it attractive. Two years ago, we heard about a smaller caravan that headed north to Tijuana, and then things went dormant. Then late last year, a larger caravan showed up, getting lots of bad P.R., but obviously some kind of success for at least some of them, all premised on illegal crossing. Now, there's this vast new caravan preparing to set off on Jan. 15 at 5:00 a.m., and far fewer of them are going to take a number as many of these past caravan migrants, still waiting at the gates, are. They're just going to march right through because that's where the instant rewards are. 

 With this going on, a very large part of the population of Honduras is going to be in the states before long, which is hardly a good thing for Honduras itself, which is already in a demographic death spiral. (All of the Central American states that send large numbers of military-aged young men are in that death spiral and cannot actually afford to lose the people, educated or not, that they are losing.)

There are a lot of reasons to favor a wall - with friendly door for legal immigrants alongside it. But probably the biggest one which will support President Trump's case for a border wall on the grounds of national security, is the new reality here - that another caravan is headed our way with thousands of people who don't want to take a number to enter - and as each successive caravan succeeds in its mission, more will be coming. 

 

Image credit: Screen grab from CBS News, via YouTube

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