Caravan migrants explore options after Tijuana border clash

Many among the more than 5,000 Central American migrants in Tijuana were urgently exploring their options amid a growing feeling that they had little hope of making successful asylum bids in the United States or of crossing the border illegally.

Most were dispirited on Monday, a day after US agents fired tear gas into Mexico to turn back some migrants who had breached the border. They saw the clash and official response as hurting their chances of reaching the US.

There was a steady line outside a shelter at a tent housing the International Organization for Migration, where officials were offering assistance for those who wanted to return to their home countries.

Officials also reported more interest from migrants wanting to start the process staying in Mexico.

A job fair matching migrants with openings in Baja California saw a growing number of inquiries.

"What happened yesterday harms all of us," Oscar Leonel Mina, a 22-year-old father from San Salvador, El Salvador, said about Sunday's border clash.

Mina and his wife and their toddler daughter avoided the march and were glad they did after hearing others recount what unfolded, he said as he sat in the doorway of his family's tent at Tijuana sports complex using a toothbrush to clean the fine dust that coats everything off his sneakers.

At the tent next door, 23-year-old Brandon Castillo of Santa Rosa, Guatemala chimed in that "they say it was the whole caravan, but it wasn't the whole caravan."
Tijuana public safety secretary Marco Antonio Sotomayor Amezcua said in a news conference that Mexican police would be prudent in their use of force, but "we have to guard at all cost that the border posts are not closed again."
Baja California state Gov. Francisco Vega said almost 9,000 migrants were in his state mostly in Tijuana, with a smaller number in Mexicali and called it "an issue of national security."