Truthout
Refugees
![Donald Trump shakes Guatemala's Interior Minister Enrique Degenhart hand as acting U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kevin K. McAleenan watches after a safe-third agreement was signed, regarding people seeking asylum while passing through Guatemala, in the Oval Office of the White House on July 26, 2019, in Washington, D.C.](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/08/GettyImages-1157815287-400x300.jpg)
Guatemala Is Not a “Safe Third Country.” Decades of US Policy Made It That Way.
Guatemala is rife with the same dangerous conditions that the Central American migrants are fleeing.
![President Trump talks to journalists before departing the White House, July 30, 2019, in Washington, D.C.](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/08/2019_0801-donald-trump-press-400x300.jpg)
Using Patriotism to Deflect Racism Is a Deadly Mistake
Claiming more loyalty to a nation built on our oppression is not going to secure us more rights or more safety.
![Migrants view a live televised speech by President Trump at a shelter for migrants on January 8, 2019, in Tijuana, Mexico.](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/07/2019_0728-migrant-shelter-400x300.jpg)
Trump Wants to Slam the Door on All Refugees
If the administration ends the resettlement program, it effectively signs off on the deaths of tens of thousands.
![Honduran asylum seeker Sandra Sanchez embraces her two-year-old daughter Yanela Sanchez at a playground on February 13, 2019, in the greater Washington D.C. area.](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/07/2019_0721-migrant-asylum-400x300.jpg)
If Left Unchecked, Trump Will Obliterate the Right to Asylum
The new asylum rule is part and parcel of Trump's systematic assault on migrants.
![New York City High School students walk out of classes to protest climate change and the government's inaction on March 15, 2019, in Columbus Circle, New York City.](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/07/2019_0718-climate-protest-400x300.jpg)
Don’t “Make War” on Climate Change
We can’t save a burning planet with the same militarist paradigms that have repeatedly set it on fire.
![A bus transporting immigrants leaves a temporary facility at a U.S. Border Patrol Station in Clint, Texas, on June 21, 2019.](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/07/2019_0714-migrant-detention-bus-400x300.jpg)
The US Is Quietly Opening Shelters for Babies and Young Kids Without Mothers
One Phoenix facility housed 12 children ages 5 and under, some as young as 3 months old, all without their mothers.
![A woman covers her face while sitting in a lobby](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/07/2019_0708-refugee-sitting-400x300.jpg)
Trump’s “Remain in Mexico” Policy Sends Asylum-Seekers Back Into Danger
Since January, more than 15,000 people have been returned to Mexico after requesting asylum in the U.S.
![An image grab taken from a video released by Local Team on June 29, 2019, shows the Sea-Watch 3 charity ship's German captain Carola Rackete being arrested by Italian police, in the Italian port of Lampedusa, Sicily.](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/06/2019_0630-carola-rackete-400x300.jpg)
Captain of Refugee Rescue Ship Arrested in Italy, Faces Up to 10 Years in Prison
"Saving lives is not a crime," tweeted Greenpeace.
![Rigoberta Vasquez, mother of sixteen-year-old migrant Carlos Hernandez Vasquez, who died Monday at a Border Patrol in Texas, shows a picture of her son on a mobile phone outside her house in San Jose El Rodeo village, Cubulco municipality, Baja Verapaz department, northwest of Guatemala City on May 22, 2019.](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/05/GettyImages-1145536959-400x300.jpg)
Child Migrants Around the World Are Being Denied Their Human Rights
The US is the only nation not to have ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
!["A polar bear walks on a melting ice floe in Baffin Bay, Nunavut, Canada. "](https://truthout.org/app/uploads/2019/04/GettyImages-486290058-400x300.jpg)
The Last Time There Was This Much CO2, Trees Grew at the South Pole
The muddled political response to very clear climate science is putting millions of people at risk.