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Children, families, and caravans arriving at our border with Mexico have been labeled "swarms," "hordes," "masses," and "threats to our national security" - epithets that demonize and degrade those fleeing poverty, violence, and now climate crisis in their countries.
Why are they here? In part, because our government has had a master hand in violently replacing democratic governments with right-wing dictatorships, which dispossessed the poor of human rights and land for much of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
Why are they here now? Increasingly because they are driven from their land and livelihood by climate crises they have no role in causing.
Migration from Central American countries, specifically Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras, to the U.S. border grew from 2007 to 2019. A recent World Food Program study found that nearly half of those leaving their Central American countries leave due to lack of food.
These three countries - referred to as...