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Sunday, November 18, 2018

Migrants choose Tijuana POE: Is it because of "sanctuary" and El Chapo not diversifying?

Chivis Martinez Borderland Beat - thank you Tu Fren- WaPo


Why is the caravan going all the way to Tijuana to reach the U.S. border? One reason is “El Chapo.”


Why is the caravan going all the way to Tijuana to reach the U.S. border? One reason is “El Chapo.”

Last week, after caravan members recuperated for several days at a Mexico City sports complex, they held a vote. The group opted to travel all the way to Tijuana, Mexico’s largest border city, instead of taking a much shorter route toward the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas.

So why would they decide to go more than twice as far to reach the U.S. border?

The simplest explanation is that the activist group guiding the caravan, Pueblo Sin Fronteras (People Without Borders), has a strong support network in California, a “sanctuary” state where local officials and courts are more sympathetic to migrants.
But there’s another, idiosyncratic reason the caravan is going all the way to Tijuana: its reputation as a safer route, where migrants are less vulnerable to the kidnapping gangs and extortionists that prey on Central Americans.

This has to do, in no small part, with the legacy of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, the indicted Mexican drug kingpin whose federal grand jury trial began this week in New York.

Over nearly three decades, Guzmán built the Sinaloa drug cartel into the world’s wealthiest and most powerful trafficking organization. And despite his capture, the Sinaloa group continues to dominate the most lucrative drug smuggling routes along Mexico’s Pacific coast and into California, including the grand jewel of the North American narcotics trade, the San Ysidro port of entry. Which is also the destination for the migrant caravan.

Connecting Tijuana to California, San Ysidro is the world’s busiest border crossing, receiving nearly 100,000 northbound vehicles and pedestrians a day. It is also the single largest gateway for high-value narcotics into the United States, accounting for nearly half of the hard drugs-- heroin, cocaine, fentanyl and methamphetamine-- seized along the entire border, smuggled mostly in fake vehicle compartments.

Under Guzmán, Sinaloa waged sanguinary warfare against its rivals, eventually winning control of the entire western portion of the U.S.-Mexico border. But Sinaloa became so dominant in the North American drug trade that the criminal groups along Mexico’s eastern border (opposite Texas) developed a different criminal portfolio, especially starting in the late 2000s, in order to compete.

The two most powerful groups there, the Gulf Cartel and its now-diminished but still-dreaded rival, Los Zetas, were overshadowed and outsmarted by Guzmán in the drug trade, so they looked to diversify into other sources of revenue. Central American migration to the United States was increasing, and these groups saw tens of thousands of Hondurans, Guatemala and Salvadorans passing through areas under their control to reach the Rio Grande. Many were riding on freight trains and buses. It wasn’t hard to find them.

In 2010, Los Zetas kidnapped and massacred 72 migrants on a remote ranch an hour south of the U.S. border, an act of horrifying depravity with a ruthless business objective. The group was determined to extract profits from every migrant and smuggling guide passing through its territory. Anyone who didn’t pay risked kidnapping, torture and death. And those who didn’t pay enough could be abducted and held for ransom until relatives living in the United States handed over their life savings. They knew that almost everyone heading north had a relative or loved one financing the journey.

Their reign of terror has taken a terrible toll. Mexican human rights officials have discovered more than 1,300 mass graves since 2007, and an untold number of Central American migrants have gone missing in the Gulf Coast Mexican states of Veracruz and Tamaulipas along the route to south Texas.

This sordid state of affairs never fully developed along Mexico’s Pacific Coast and the areas under the control of Guzmán Sinaloa cartel. The Sinaloans would sometimes abduct young men and impress them into service as drug mules, fitting them with marijuana-stuffed backpacks for a grueling trek through the Arizona desert. But some Central Americans viewed this as a mutually beneficial arrangement. A free guided trip into the United States was the price for carrying Sinaloan brick weed.

You would also hear from many Mexicans that Guzmán was a drug kingpin who lived by a code, like the Sicilian mob bosses or the Omar character in “The Wire.” A tunnel-digging, meth-making, cocaine-shipping mastermind, and a killer, but not a monster who kidnaps and butchers humble Central American migrants. This appeared to explain, more than anything, why Central Americans were routinely murdered and disappeared in one part of Mexico but not (or far less) in another.

So when it came time last week for caravan members to pick between a shorter route to Texas or a much longer one to Tijuana, they chose the latter.

One leads to the migrant version of Mordor. The other is merely dangerous.

33 comments:

  1. Even the Central Americans know that El Señor Chapo Guzman did not kill innocents.

    Gente Nueva Special Forces are the best killers and most highly trained cartel special ops soldiers but we always follow one rule "never kill innocents ".One Combat Applications Group and a Special Air Service commando lieutenant were very impressed with the almost non existant collateral damage of my team missions.
    El Sr M1 El Ondeado always followed this rule when he was hunting the Beltranes. El Sr R5 never ever killed a civilian.El Sr Bravo Aponte taught my people very well only go after the enemy never the innocent ones.Thats a rule that comes from our leadership El Sr Chapo El Sr Mayo El Sr Azul

    SICARIO 006

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Get real....Chapo killed anyone who got in his way or ordered their demise, be they innocents or criminals. He is a mass murdering piece of sewage who deserves his concrete cell at ADX in a few months.

      Delete
    2. Sacario 006, no weapons allowed in courtroom. And no autograph s of Chapo.

      Delete
    3. 4:04; Damn when the truth hurts you just slap em with a little fantasy! Grow up joven

      Delete
  2. Leave el Sr. Out of this mess already has enough problems

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Maybe you can petition the court and the judge will let you give chapo a hug!

      Delete
  3. Time to amass troops an BP there too to stop the invasion. We need skilled labor and bright minds, not the poor and those seeking entitlements.

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    Replies
    1. Mexico cant even protect their own borders, this honduran posse just rolled right thru like putting a knife to butter. The government should protect their people by putting up a refried fence...

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    2. Actually 3:12 the English, French, and Spanish came here and took the lands from the native people. We then rose up against the crown of England because of taxation and the desire to be independent from someone thousands of miles away. After the revolutionary war we expanded to the west. Yes we slaughtered the Indians but so did everyone else. We purchased land owned by the French and Spanish and went to war against the Mexicans for the south west border.

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    3. 9:14 Refreshing to see a comment that referenced reality - thanks! However remember that when America was taking up arms against its government, many of America’s most “respectable” names were the largest drug dealers in the world at the time. No telling how many Chinese were killed with Astor’s opium and many other actions of the day who still have their names on buildings at all of the Ivy League schools.

      Delete
  4. Chapo su fama sigue creciondo en los anales de la historia. Como a ayudado a la gente lo quieren con mucho esmero. Y en el ranchito de Badiraguato eres un hombre de agricultura.

    ReplyDelete
  5. In Hope's of getting more votes...migrants or son of migrants dont vote...trust me I know

    ReplyDelete
  6. “Illegal Immigrants chose Tijuana”

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  7. So this article illustrates the compassion Chapo displays towards migrants?
    Where by contracting services for some to illegally traffic narcotics into the US for safe passage?
    Chapo is far from a saint portrayed by those. Rather, a persistent criminal who will and has taken advantage of all opportunities without regrets.

    The only difference between Chapo and those other cartels is how the money is generated from migrants.

    I see the reasoning behind the caravan traveling further due to political state differences pertaining immigration policies.

    In the end they are all criminals.

    E42

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  8. I'm sure whether played a part in this decision

    ReplyDelete
  9. They are going to Tijuana because that’s where California is, the Democrats control it.
    Also every state is helping bus the illegals to Tijuana because they want to get them out of their state Quickly.
    Now it’s Tijuana’s problem and the citizens don’t like it

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. 12:39 PM they aren't "illegals" They are asylees fleeing violence, coming legally.

      You do not speak for the citizenry of Mexico.

      Delete
    2. They are illegals they entered the country illegal.
      They declined to stay in Mexico, they aren’t refugees. They are country shopping

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    3. 5:30 "asyless" my ass they invadors for the way they entered Mexico n that same way they will try to cross the USA/MEXICO border demanding for things they didnt have the guts to demand for in their countries..

      Delete
    4. Immigrants mentioned here are NOT illegal. U.S. law says that people seeking asylum can jump the border fence if need be and ask for asylum.
      Learn the law.

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    5. You live in a fairy tale to believe those who clandestinely cross the border will present themselves to immigration officials and present their claims of asylum. Once over the line, these illegals will purchase forged documents and attempt to make those around them believe that they are here legally. Those who point to a recent ruling by a federal judge don't point out that it was a liberal judge from San Francisco, and we know what kinda of place that city has fallen to- homelessness at record rates, drug addicts, and human feces. We need order, not chaos.

      Delete
  10. Anybody knows what is going on in magdalena? They killed the plaza boss two days ago. Shootings last night.

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  11. We all knew this was gonna happen (the caravans headed to Califas).. I hate to lay it all off on the Blue team but they've enabled this unregulated influx of people by minimizing the scope of the problem. They either vanish or deflect when the discussion shifts to border security.

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  12. Tough situation for those migrants from the caravan.
    Leaving a moral position of differences among many.
    In truth; Anyone walking ths earth has no true refuge due to political issues. Leaving many without possibilities and hope. Only Rather, to succumb to the suffering of life.

    Making one to really think; Are we prisoners of our own world? Most countries have immigration laws which can be favorable for some, while not for others.

    Just something to ponder on.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Just know, even with all its faults and problems that we deal with,if you were born in the USA, you won the lottery of life. Why else would people die trying to get here or send there children unaccompanied to get here?

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    2. U make a valid point of view.

      @8:46

      E42

      Delete
  13. Chivis El H past away today here is the link by Zeta

    -the guy who knows nothing

    http://zetatijuana.com/2018/11/el-capo-sinaloense-hector-beltran-leyva-el-h-fallece-tras-sufrir-un-infarto-en-el-altiplano/?fbclid=IwAR2fE8J7oTgtXQ61dPorrPN5khlE6FGYhmxeNQ1gkvB3jZtgOeOcVcfkpFo

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. thank you looks like i was working on a post same time you sent it in! but thank you very much for making sure I knew. what a tragic family.

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    2. Same as Arellano Felix. Ramon-dead. Franscico-dead. Benjamin- locked up for another 10 years. Eduardo-gets out anytime now. Tigrillo- Gets out anytime now for spilling the beans on his brothers. It seems like all the drug cartels bearing the last name have worse luck than other cartels.

      Delete
  14. If they are so frightened then why do they wave that Honduran flag with such pride? If they love the place, they should stay and fight for change instead of heading off to another country and live off its tax payers. I don't care what anyone says, those people don't speak English and I highly doubt they have marketable skills.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Litle do they know that mencho has that plaza with ctng/cjng

    ReplyDelete
  16. Ya think because California is a sanctuary state?! Think that's why they have a strong support Network?? Lol, obviously they're taking advantage of California Democrats

    ReplyDelete

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