Immigrants at the El Paso Border

Check out WOLA's podcast, where Lisette Alvarez interviews Adam Isacson about his trip to the U.S.-Mexico border. Plenty of food for thought, much of which does not tend to reach the mainstream media.

1. When so many people want to be caught for asylum, the wall is moot.

2. Border Patrol agents don't want resources spent on walls in the desert, where people cross with no problem even with a wall. They want more people to help process families.

3. Migrants forced to stay in Mexico are being kidnapped for ransom in large numbers.

4. Mexican organized crime controls the border, so guardsmen have little impact.

5. AMLO is just as cruel as any other past president with immigrants. Ideology doesn't matter.

6. Cuban migrants are especially targeted because of the perception of their relatives' resources.

7. Once the immigrant suffering is pushed into Mexico (with Remain in Mexico) rather than the U.S., it disappears from almost everyone's view in the U.S.

Go listen to the whole thing.

And incidentally, Adam is typically measured but clearly pissed off about all the callous treatment of suffering. He doesn't use the phrase "cruelty is the point" but it hangs over everything.