Immigration Dention Center, Tapachula, Mexico

A reader recently noted that Mexico is not doing anything to stem immigration and that the "U.S. is the only country to treat these immigrants as human beings." Like many populist renditions of the immigration issue, lore takes over common sense, and basic public information becomes misinformation. For poverty travelers, the "border" really begins in Guatemala, and extends across the Rio Grande and into Arizona, Texas, or New Mexico. The Instituto Nacional de Migración in Tapachula, Mexico (below), is a detention center for poverty travelers. Comparisons can be freely made with other detention centers closer to home.

Below, Cuban detainees













Below, 8 year old detainee