Daily Times

Honduran Rolando Rodrigo arrived last week in the Mexican city of Tapachula with his family, just one stop on the long route to the United States and the dream of a new life free from the poverty and gang violence that wracks their homeland.

But faced with increased controls by Mexican authorities, at the behest of Washington, to stem the flow of migrants heading north from Central America, they’re considering postponing their “American dream” for the time being.

Just hours after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard exchanged congratulations on “significant progress” in a deal to slow down the wave of undocumented migrants heading for US soil, Rodrigo wandered about Tapachula’s central square with his three-year-old son Gadiel asking for money to feed his family.

The 29 year old arrived in Mexico on Friday with his wife Miriam, Gadiel and a young daughter. They’ve taken a modest hotel room in this south Mexican town, but only have enough money for a few nights’ stay.

They crossed the border into Mexico over rugged, hilly terrain near Tacana, a 4,000-meter high volcano near the border where they saw no sign of Mexico’s National Guard.

In June, Mexico deployed thousands of soldiers and police officers, both near its southern border with Guatemala and its northern border with the United States to slow the migrant flow, which has come principally from impoverished and crime-ridden Central American countries.

Rodrigo’s family carefully avoided the heavily guarded Suchiate river that forms part of the Mexico-Guatemala border.

“When you know the route well, you know how to go about” crossing the border, said Rodrigo.