General Immigration

Ever since unaccompanied child migrants became a national news story six weeks ago, many people have started asking: Is this an immigration crisis, or is it a refugee crisis? In response, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said last week it wants to designate many of the Central Americans fleeing regional violence and gang extortion as refugees. Read more >

This story first appeared on the TomDispatch website.

Shena Gutierrez was already cuffed and in an inspection room in Nogales, Arizona, when the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agent grabbed her purse, opened it, and dumped its contents onto the floor right in front of her. There couldn't be a sharper image of the Bill of Rights rollback we are experiencing in the US borderlands in the post-9/11 era. Read more >

Nationwide protests aimed to plug the gaping hole in America’s porous border with Mexico and stop the flow of illegal aliens - many of them unaccompanied children – amid mounting costs are scheduled for July 18-19. Read more >

With dozens of undocumented immigrant children expected to arrive Tuesday morning at a secluded boys camp in the Arizona mountains, protesters will gather to greet the federal buses in a potential replay of this month's demonstrations in Murrieta, California — with the support of the local sheriff. Read more >

Cristian Omar Reyes, an 11-year-old sixth grader in the neighborhood of Nueva Suyapa, on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa, tells me he has to get out of Honduras soon — “no matter what.” Read more >

Guess who commissioned “La Bestia,” a Central American radio hit about the dangers of the journey to America?

“Migrants from everywhere, entrenched along the rail ties. Far away from where they come, further away from where they go,” singer Eddie Ganz croons in Spanish over the Caribbean beat of the marimba, a wooden xylophone-like instrument from Guatemala. “They call her the Beast from the South, this wretched train of death. With the devil in the boiler, whistles, roars, twists and turns.” Read more >