The scene at the border. Dramatic pictures of the chaos in Tijuana, Mexico over the past 24 hours. Hundreds of migrants from Central America attempted to storm the U.S. border, desperate to reach U.S. soil. U.S. authorities and Mexican police took unprecedented measures to stop them. And photographers captured this image, a woman, leading her young children, running from the tear gas fired by U.S. authorities. That picture is getting a lot of attention even this morning, so let's go to Lyndsay Duncombe, who's in Washington, on this story. Tell us, and anyone not following over the course of the weekend, what happened on the border or at the border over these last 24 hours, Lyndsay.
Well, it began, Heather, as a protest. People who are staying in camps at the edge of the US border uh with Mexico are frustrated with the fact that such a small number of people, uh just dozens really, are being processed every day, so they planned this march which was to raise attention to that. Of those marchers, though, uh some of them started to rush the border and officials say they started throwing things at the border guard and as a result the border officials took this step that they took, which is to fire that tear gas into the crowd to disperse them away from the border; and at the same time, the U.S. officials actually shut down this incredibly busy border crossing for several hours. And uh certainly it shows us how that frustration that is building, the desperation that is building, is really reaching this crisis point at the border.
So what is going to happen next then, do you think?
Well, we need to watch this from the political side of things, because uh this is motivating Donald Trump to continue to push his idea of a border wall and the images that you see there of people crashing into the border are things that are expected to help him in that push. In a tweet he said “Congress, fund the WALL!”, and that’s significant because the Republicans just have thirty-nine days where they have control of the House of Representatives, and it is possible that some parts of the Government could shut down as Donald Trump continues to push for funding for that wall. He also is putting pressure on Mexico, because there is a lot of developments happening between the two countries as they try to figure out what to do with the migrants. Because on Saturday, Heather, the new President of Mexico will be sworn in and there are are uh reports that the U.S. and Mexico have reached an agreement that would mean that migrants who are making their way from Central America, who are processed, would not be allowed in to the United States to wait for their immigration proceedings, but rather would have that happen in Mexico. Unclear if that’s exactly what the new president has agreed to, but this crisis over the weekend, the flashpoint in the incident, really is um a backdrop for Congressional negotiations as well as these bilateral negotiations between the US and Mexico.
Lyndsay, thank you very much. Lyndsay Duncombe there in Washington.
