US Shuts Border After Hundreds Break Blockade

US agents also fire tear gas
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Nov 25, 2018 4:15 PM CST
US Shuts Border, Hits Migrants With Tear Gas
Migrants push past Mexican police at the Chaparral border crossing in Tijuana, Mexico, Sunday, Nov. 25, 2018, as they try to reach the United States.   (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)

Migrants approaching the US border from Mexico were enveloped with tear gas Sunday after a few tried to breach the fence separating the two countries, the AP reports. US agents shot the gas, according to an AP reporter on the scene. Children were screaming and coughing in the mayhem. Honduran migrant Ana Zuniga, 23, says she saw migrants open a small hole in concertina wire at a gap on the Mexican side of a levee, at which point US agents fired tear gas at them. "We ran, but when you run the gas asphyxiates you more," she says while cradling her 3-year-old daughter Valery in her arms. Mexico's Milenio TV also showed images of several migrants at the border trying to jump over the fence. Yards away on the US side, shoppers streamed in and out of an outlet mall.

US Border Patrol helicopters flew overhead, while US agents held vigil on foot beyond the wire fence in California. The Border Patrol office in San Diego said via Twitter that pedestrian crossings have been suspended at the San Ysidro port of entry at both the East and West facilities. All northbound and southbound traffic was halted. Earlier Sunday, several hundred Central American migrants pushed past a blockade of Mexican police who were standing guard near the international border crossing. They appeared to easily pass through without using violence, and some of the migrants called on each other to remain peaceful. They convened the demonstration to try to pressure the US to hear their asylum claims and carried hand-painted American and Honduran flags while chanting: "We are not criminals! We are international workers!" (A mother was impaled trying to sneak across the border.)

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