Sunday, Jazz wrote about the latest caravan of Central American migrants headed for the United States. About 2,500 people made their way onto a bridge over the river that forms the border between Mexico and Guatemala but the Mexican authorities refused to allow them to enter. Today, the situation escalated with hundreds of migrants moving from the bridge to the river and wading across into Mexico:

The migrants moved off the border bridge and toward the river after Mexican officials told them they would not be granted passage through the country.

Amid shouts and even some fireworks they began wading across the shallow river.

On the Mexican side, migrants ran from side to side along the river bank, kicking up dust and looking for an opening in the ranks of National Guard troops sent to meet them…

The migrants want free passage across Mexico to the U.S. border and Mexico’s government on Monday rejected that.

While the government says the migrants are free to enter — and could compete for jobs if they want to stay and work — in practice, it has restricted such migrants to the southernmost states while their cases are processed by a sluggish bureaucracy. Those who do not request asylum or some protective status would likely be detained and deported.

Here’s what that looked like:

#BREAKING Migrants from new caravan cross Suchiate river and have reached Mexico. pic.twitter.com/CKCdFqsATP

— teleSUR English (@telesurenglish) January 20, 2020

#BREAKING_NEWS ll Migrants from new caravan cross the #Suchiate River, border with #Guatemala, to reached #Mexico
Video: @ana_alicia_m2 pic.twitter.com/ALewSBvpmA

— Pichincha Communications (@EnPichinchaU) January 20, 2020

There was a face off with Mexican police once they reached the other side of the river. This next tweet reads “In a desperate attempt to enter #Mexico , hundreds of Central Americans that make up a new #Caravana elements of the National Guard faced stones.”

#Nacional // Cientos de Migrantes se enfrentan a pedradas a la Guardia Nacional

En un desesperado intento por ingresar a #Mexico, cientos de centroamericanos que integran una nueva #Caravana se enfrentaron a pedradas a elementos de la Guardia Nacional. pic.twitter.com/j7HUswWFS1

— MV Noticias (@emevenoticias) January 20, 2020

Some real chaos on the Mexican side:

#ÚltimaHora Enfrentamiento entre migrantes y Guardia Nacional al pasar por el río Suchiate. Vía: Alejandro Gómez | Diario del Sur pic.twitter.com/dZotgGyjcI

— Diario del Sur (@diariosur_oem) January 20, 2020

From the Washington Post:

Video posted on social media showed men throwing rocks and bottles at uniformed security forces. Troops surround and grapple with men in T-shirts and jeans while other men and women flee.

“We only want to cross to the United States. We don’t want to stay” in Mexico, one migrant identified Ingrid said in a video interview with Reuters. “Let me pass. I only want to work. I’m a single mom and I don’t want to return to my country where there is nothing.”

This used to be how things operated. Mexico would let migrants pass through, knowing they were headed for the US. Now things are different. Even those who get through the line of police at the river are likely to be picked up on the road north.

This RT clip gives a full view of what happened over the span of an hour.