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Outrageous: Caravanners Offer To Return Home If US Pays Them $50,000 Each

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We’ve all seen the eye-opening images: Hordes of people from migrant “caravans” have moved from Central America into Mexico, pushing past border checkpoints and clashing with officials.

Thousands of those migrants are now near the U.S.-Mexico border, creating chaos in places like Tijuana. All the while, the left has insisted that they’re merely fleeing oppression and want “a better life,” which America is apparently obliged to give them.

But a shocking update from those same migrants is casting doubt on the liberal narrative. The caravans are now making demands from the United States, and it’s almost impossible to see it as anything other than mass extortion.

According to The San Diego Union Tribune, caravan members marched on the U.S. consulate in Tijuana and demanded that either they be granted entry across the border, or be paid tens of thousands of dollars.

“Two groups of Central American migrants made separate marches on the U.S. Consulate in Tijuana Tuesday, demanding that they be processed through the asylum system more quickly and in greater numbers,” the newspaper reported.

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They’re also demanding “that deportations be halted and that President Trump either let them into the country or pay them $50,000 each to go home.”

Yes, that’s $50,000 per immigrant. To put that in perspective, the average yearly wage in Mexico is about $15,000 dollars. In Honduras, it’s even less.

Where did that absurd number come from? Caravan organizers declared that it was essentially reparations for what the United States “stole” from Central America.

“It may seem like a lot of money to you,” declared organizer Alfonso Guerrero Ulloa. “But it is a small sum compared to everything the United States has stolen from Honduras.”

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It’s worth remembering that the Mexican government previously offered working visas and at least basic jobs for the migrants. The vast majority refused, and chose instead to try to illegally cross border fences — often waving the flags of their home countries.

The hostile, almost ransom-like insistence on being paid over three times Mexico’s average annual wage seems to be completely opposite of past claims that their trek was about escaping crime and poverty back home. It looks now like a get-rich-quick scheme that fell apart.

And if the group’s demands are not met? Well, it isn’t clear what they’ll do.

“They gave the U.S. Consulate 72 hours to respond. They said they had not decided what to do if their demands were not met,” stated The San Diego Union Tribune.

“I don’t know, we will decide as a group,” Ulloa said.

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Some caravan members essentially admitted that they expected to cut to the front of the immigration line and enter the United States no questions asked, a delusion that was abruptly halted by President Trump.

“A lot of people are leaving because there is no solution here,” said Douglas Matute in Tijuana. “We thought they would let us in. But Trump sent the military instead of social workers.”

In one of the most bizarre twists, caravan members blamed their situation on Americans “intervening” in Central America. Their solution? Demand that President Donald Trump intervene in Central America.

“[F]amilies, women and children who have fled our countries continue to suffer and the civil society of Tijuana continue to be forces to confront this humanitarian crisis, a refugee crisis caused in great part by decades of U.S. intervention in Central America,” one of the letters delivered to the American consulate insisted.

Yet intervention is exactly what the groups say they want.

“[T]he majority of [caravan members] are young men who are fleeing from poverty, insecurity and political repression under the dictatorship of Juan Orlando Hernandez,” lamented a second letter, according to The Tribune.

“Orlando Hernandez is the president of Honduras. Their letter also asked the U.S. to remove Orlando Hernandez from office,” the San Diego newspaper explained.

Well, so much for that narrative.

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Benjamin Arie is an independent journalist and writer. He has personally covered everything ranging from local crime to the U.S. president as a reporter in Michigan before focusing on national politics. Ben frequently travels to Latin America and has spent years living in Mexico.




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