Desperate Journeys: With little but poverty and violence at home, migrants from Central America are risking everything to get to the U.S. What will happen to them?

• Author: Smith, Patricia
• Position: INTERNATIONAL

Thousands of men, women, and children--many carrying small bags with a few precious belongings and wearing flimsy shoes--were trekking north through Mexico last month.

They had joined a caravan of Central American migrants from Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala who were fleeing poverty and violence and were desperate to reach the United States.

Though the trek through Central America and Mexico to the U.S. border is notoriously dangerous--there are unscrupulous smugglers, dangerous desert crossings, and the risk of kidnapping by deadly Mexican drug cartels--many migrants, who heard about the growing caravan on Facebook and WhatsApp, said they had no choice but to leave their home countries for a chance at a better life.

Kinzinyer Gabriela Hernandez, 17, was traveling in the caravan from Honduras with her 2-year-old daughter and her 16-year-old sister.

"My husband knows that we're on our way, but not exactly where we are," she said, as she washed in a river near a small town in southern Mexico. "God gives me the faith to keep going."

Crackdown on Immigration

The people in the caravan are part of a surge in migration from Central America to the U.S. that began a few years ago. In the past year, more than 100,000 families from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador have been apprehended or otherwise stopped at the U.S. border with Mexico. Another 38,000 children traveling by themselves from those three countries were also stopped. The number of Guatemalan and Honduran families picked up at the border has more than doubled in the past two years. And an unknown number of migrants from these countries have made it into the U.S. without being caught.

Americans remain divided over what to do about the situation. While many people sympathize with the migrants' plight and favor giving them some form of assistance, anti-immigrant feeling has also swelled recently. In fact, opposition to illegal immigration became a big issue in the recent midterm elections.

President Trump has vowed to crack down on illegal immigration and those coming to the U.S. from Central America to seek asylum. And he's singled out the caravan of migrants as a potential threat to Americans and has sent U.S. troops to the border to keep them out.

"We cannot allow our country to be violated like this," Trump said.

Trump has also vowed to automatically deny asylum to anyone who crosses the border illegally. This new policy immediately prompted lawsuits from immigrant rights groups, who say it violates existing laws. Many of the Central American migrants coming to the U.S. apply for asylum, saying they are fleeing violence in their home countries.

The U.S. has also tried other methods to stanch the flow of migrants from Central America. In late September, Kevin McAleenan, the commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, traveled to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador--the three countries that make up the bulk of the migrants apprehended at the southwestern border.

One of the places McAleenan visited was the western highlands of Guatemala, a region where 76 percent of the population lives in poverty and 67 percent of children younger than 5 suffer from chronic malnutrition, according to the U.S. Agency for International Development.

It's a region where almost everyone has family--or knows someone with family--in the U.S. And many of those who remain have hopes of getting to the U.S. eventually.

While in Guatemala, McAleenan told those he met with that he understood that most people leaving the country were trying to find work. But he reminded them that illegally crossing the American border is a crime, and he warned of smugglers who have misled desperate migrants by assuring them that they can remain in the U.S. if they arrive as families.

"There is no ability to stay in the United States if you bring a child, and there is no ability to stay if you are pregnant," McAleenan said. "We need to continue to provide accurate information so they won't make this dangerous journey, where they face physical and sexual assault."

Smugglers on Facebook

The United States is planning to spend more than $200 million on projects in Guatemala over the next few years to create jobs and reduce poverty, officials say. The U.S. has also tried to deter illegal immigration by harshly cracking down on border crossings this year--including with the now-defunct and widely condemned practice of separating migrant children from their detained parents and other relatives.

Additionally, the U.S. has launched a $1.3 million advertising campaign to warn people in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras about the dangers of the journey north. In Guatemala, nine billboards, as well as radio and TV commercials, urge people not to make the trip.

But interviews with more than a dozen people in the Guatemalan highlands' largest city and several small towns showed that few residents have seen or heard the warnings. Many said they would not be persuaded to stay where they are anyway.

At the same time, a parallel--and far more powerful--messaging campaign by smugglers is spread by word of mouth.

Guatemalans say they see daily advertisements by the smugglers, known as coyotes, promising to get them to the U.S. On one radio station, smugglers regularly offer to transport and help...