Migrants walk along the highway through Suchiate, Chiapas state in southern Mexico, on July 21, 2024, during their journey north toward the U.S. border.
| Photo Credit: AP

Hundreds of migrants from around a dozen countries left from Mexico’s southern border on foot on July 21, as they attempt to make it to the U.S. border.

Some of the members of the group said they hoped to make it to the U.S. border before elections are held in November, because they fear that if Donald Trump wins, he will follow through on a promise to close the border to asylum-seekers.

“We are running the risk that permits (to cross the border) might be blocked,” said Miguel Salazar, a migrant from El Salvador. He feared that a new Trump administration might stop granting appointments to migrants through CBP One, an app used by asylum-seekers to enter the U.S. legally — by getting appointments at U.S. border posts, where they make their cases to officials. The app only works once migrants reach Mexico City, or states in northern Mexico. “Everyone wants to use that route” said Salazar, 37.

The group left on Sunday from the southern Mexican town of Ciudad Hidalgo, which is next to a river that marks Mexico’s border with Guatemala. Some said they had been waiting in Ciudad Hidalgo for weeks for permits to travel to towns further to the north.

Migrants trying to pass through Mexico in recent years have organised large groups to try to reduce the risk of being attacked by gangs or stopped by Mexican immigration officials as they travel. But the caravans tend to break up in southern Mexico, as people get tired of walking for hundreds of miles (kilometres).

Recently, Mexico has also made it more difficult for migrants to reach the U.S. border on buses and trains.

Travel permits are rarely awarded to migrants who enter the country without visas and thousands of migrants have been detained by immigration officers at checkpoints in the centre and north of Mexico and bused back to towns deep in the south of the country.

Oswaldo Reyna, a 55-year-old Cuban migrant, crossed from Guatemala into Mexico 45 days ago and waited in Ciudad Hidalgo to join the new caravan announced on social media. He criticised Mr. Trump’s recent comments about migrants and how they are trying to “invade” the United States.

“We are not delinquents,” he said. “We are hard-working people who have left our country to get ahead in life, because in our homeland we are suffering from many needs.”

Billionaire Elon Musk has expressed concern over a video showing streaming across the US border with Mexico into Eagle Pass, Texas. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Mr Musk demanded “preventive action” while claiming that about two million people are entering through the US border every year. This comes as an overwhelmed city of Texas declared an emergency on the issue, according to New York Times (NYT). Texas’ Mayor Rolando Salinas said 7,200 people have illegally crossed the border in the previous week, with 2,500 on Monday alone.

“Strange that there is almost no legacy media coverage of this. About 2 million people – from every country on Earth – are entering through the US southern border every year. The number is rising rapidly, yet no preventive action is taken by the current administration,” Mr Musk said in his post.

Strange that there is almost no legacy media coverage of this.

About 2 million people – from every country on Earth – are entering through the US southern border every year.

The number is rising rapidly, yet no preventive action is taken by the current administration. https://t.co/EF7HTS1ktT

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 20, 2023

He reacted to a video that showed thousands of migrants standing under the bride at Eagle Pass, waiting to cross into the US. One of the clips also showed them casually walking towards the US border.

The arrivals included a large number of people from Venezuela. The substantial increase has put additional strain on local governments in California, Arizona and Texas. The lone shelter provider in Texas failed to accommodate the sudden surge in the number of migrants and many were released onto the streets of the city, said the NYT report.

“They are walking around the streets. The hospital is getting swamped also,” Mr Salinas told the outlet, adding that the situation is similar to what the city experienced in 2021.

Eagle Pass has a US Customs and Border Protection processing facility which opened in 2022 with a capacity for 1,000 people.