Trump fumes as migrant caravan closes in on US border

Donald Trump lashed out as a ‘caravan’ of hundreds of Central American migrants headed toward the US border.

Donald Trump at the annual White House Easter Egg Roll. Picture: Reuters

Donald Trump lashed out yesterday over immigration, an outburst triggered by images of a “caravan” of hundreds of Central American migrants headed towards the US border.

For the second straight day, the US President took to Twitter to ­attack Mexico for allowing the 1500-strong group to march unimpeded towards America, their daily progress mapped by the media. He threatened to abrogate NAFTA — the US-Mexico-­Canada free-trade pact — while demanding congress pass tougher immigration legislation and support his plan for a wall along the Mexican frontier.

He declared he no longer supported a replacement for DACA, the program that had offered protection against deportation for about 700,000 undocumented immigrants, most of them Mexicans, who came to the US as children.

Since taking office more than a year ago, Mr Trump has sought to crack down on legal and undocumented immigration, but some of his proposals have become tied up in court and congress.

“As ridiculous as it sounds, the laws of our country do not easily allow us to send those crossing our Southern Border back where they came from. A whole big wasted procedure must take place,” Mr Trump tweeted, following similar comments since Monday. “Mexico & Canada have tough immigration laws, whereas ours are an Obama joke. ACT CONGRESS.”

The administration’s statistics showed that arrests of undocumented migrants soared in the first year of Mr Trump’s presidency, while illegal border crossings plummeted.

Members of the caravan rest at Matias Romero. Picture: AFP

Data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement suggested, however, that processes to deport arrested illegal immigrants had become even more backed-up.

“Honduras, Mexico and many other countries that the US is very generous to, sends many of their people to our country through our WEAK IMMIGRATION POLICIES. Caravans are heading here. Must pass tough laws and build the WALL. Democrats allow open borders, drugs and crime!”

On Monday he said Mexico “must stop the big drug and people flows, or I will stop their cash cow, NAFTA”.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto demanded that the US respectfully pursue NAFTA trade talks. Mexico’s government “under no circumstances” promotes irregular migration, the government said in a statement.

It described the caravan as “a public demonstration that seeks to draw attention to the migratory phenomenon and the importance of respecting the rights of Central American migrants”.

The caravan was passing through the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca yesterday.

Meanwhile, the White House said it was amenable to a White House meeting between Mr Trump and Vladimir Putin, raising the prospect of the Russian President’s first Washington visit in more than a decade even as ties between the powers have eroded.

Press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the White House was among “a number of potential venues” Mr Trump and Mr Putin discussed in a call last month.

Mr Putin last entered the Oval Office to meet president George W. Bush in 2005. Alarms rang over the prospect that Mr Trump might offer Mr Putin that venue without confronting him about interference in the 2016 presidential election or allegations that Russia masterminded the March 4 nerve agent attack on a former Russian double agent. “It would confer a certain normalisation of relations and we’re certainly not in a normal space,” said Alina Polyakova of the Brookings Institution. “Nothing about this is normal.”

AFP, AP