To slow down illegal immigration, U.S. funds PR campaign in Mexico, Central American

The federal government is attempting a more proactive approach to stopping the flow of illegal immigration from Mexico and Central America: trying to tell the dangers of crossing the border on and in Mexican and Central American television stations and newspapers. Paloma Esquivel of the Los Angeles Times reports the outreach was initially shunned, but is now being embraced. Newspapers in some Mexican states and El Salvador and Guatemala are now running stories about boarder-crossing dangers.

Esquivel reports the efforts have been so successful that the stories have been circulated in U.S. cities with large immigrant communities. The goal is to get residents to convince family back home to not make the trip, especially across the Arizona border. "Our message is: If you do decide to come, don't come through Arizona," said Border Patrol spokesman Andy Adame. "We're seeing a big increase in smuggler abuse; robberies with AK-47s and pistols, knives; rapes of women, more physical abuses — not only in the desert but in safe houses where people are tied up with duct tape."

The effect the campaign will have on migrant workers is unclear, but the number of apprehensions at the border is down to 340,000 last year from 1.6 million in 2000. Many experts say the drop is because fewer people are trying to cross the border. Some critics denounce the campaign for lack of transparency, but officials contend it has been successful. (Read more)