The great industry of Guatemalan migration

[Dark]

Regardless of the threats or the wall, a record number of Guatemalan families in the last year embarked on the road to the United States to surrender to the Border Patrol in order to start a new life. A trip to the origin of migration in Guatemala shows why, if the government of Donald Trump wants to stop waves of migrants, he should look at Central America.

never had the 'American dream'. In his eastern Guatemalan village he had his cornfield and bean crops to eat and coffee plantations to make a living. But last April, at 36, he made the backpack. After agreeing to pay 40,000 quetzales (just over 5,000 dollars) with a coyote, he set out for the United States with the eldest of his three children, K, aged 11. For fear of reprisals, father and son prefer not to give their full name.

"I did not dream of migrating, but the need forced me. I do not want my children to grow up in a place of violence and poverty, "says 'F' from the room where he lives in Texas with his son. In recent years, the collapse of coffee prices and the increase in the presence of gangs in his community, which were already starting to bother 'K', made him think that there he could not give his children a future and he started to plan the trip. His wife and he were convinced that, even if they had to separate, migrating was the best investment for the family.

The great industry of Guatemalan migration
By LORENA ARROYO and ANDREA PATIÑO CONTRERASDESLIZA TO CONTINUE
Regardless of the threats or the wall, a record number of Guatemalan families in the last year embarked on the road to the United States to surrender to the Border Patrol in order to start a new life. A trip to the origin of migration in Guatemala shows why, if the government of Donald Trump wants to stop waves of migrants, he should look at Central America.

When a child is a 'visa' to avoid deportation

'F' never had the 'American dream'. In his eastern Guatemalan village he had his cornfield and bean crops to eat and coffee plantations to make a living. But last April, at 36, he made the backpack. After agreeing to pay 40,000 quetzales (just over 5,000 dollars) with a coyote, he set out for the United States with the eldest of his three children, K, aged 11. For fear of reprisals, father and son prefer not to give their full name.

ALMUDENA TORAL / UNIVISION
"I did not dream of migrating, but the need forced me. I do not want my children to grow up in a place of violence and poverty, "says 'F' from the room where he lives in Texas with his son. In recent years, the collapse of coffee prices and the increase in the presence of gangs in his community, which were already starting to bother 'K', made him think that there he could not give his children a future and he started to plan the trip. His wife and he were convinced that, even if they had to separate, migrating was the best investment for the family.

On April 6, very early, father and son said goodbye to theirs and began the trip north: "On the way we had run out of water and had to walk a lot, but my son told me: 'Do not worry. I was already born for this, "recalls the father excitedly.

After 17 days of traveling, they arrived at the United States border with a clear idea: they would not elude the Border Patrol but would appear before it. "(The coyotes) crossed the river and at the border we did not last half an hour and we were surrounded by migration and we surrendered," he says.

He is one of the tens of thousands of Guatemalans who arrived in the United States last year with a child by the hand to surrender to immigration authorities and seek asylum. The reason: migrating with a minor guarantees many times that they do not deport them immediately.

The noisy threats of the Donald Trump administration against illegal immigration, which had its most critical point in the middle of the year with the separation of children from their parents on the border by the policy of 'zero tolerance', have failed to stop the flow of groups with children and unaccompanied minors arriving in the United States.

According to several sources consulted by Univision Noticias, in Guatemala the coyotes have been promoting travel with children for months and may charge up to half the regular price for adults traveling with them. The offer is because with children the journey is shorter: instead of risking a dangerous journey through the desert with families, the coyotes leave the migrants as soon as they cross the southern border of the United States, with the instruction that wait for the Border Patrol to request protection.