On Oct. 31, 2023, the @EndWokeness account on X posted a video of what looked to be thousands of migants walking together on a road. The caption of the post read, "While they have us distracted, a massive caravan is marching to storm our border. This is not a crisis. It’s an invasion." X owner Elon Musk reposted it.
While they have us distracted, a massive caravan is marching to storm our border.
This is not a crisis. It’s an invasion. pic.twitter.com/p1ukDTMdNZ
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) October 31, 2023
It's true that this video showed a large migrant caravan that was leaving southern Mexico and walking to the southwest U.S. border. However, the allegation that the group intended to "storm our border" was made with no credible evidence.
Reuters published that the video had been recorded on Oct. 30 and reported two estimates for the size of the group: "some 3,500 people" or "around 5,000." Meanwhile, two different estimates published by Telemundo placed the caravan's size at over 4,000 or over 8,000 migrants.
The men, women and children walking in the caravan had come from Central America, Venezuela, Cuba and Haiti. They began their walk to the U.S. border after complaining that the wait to be processed in Mexico was taking too long, The Associated Press reported.
As for the post from @EndWokeness, the user claimed that the caravan planned to "storm" the U.S. border. Merriam-Webster defines the verb "storm" as "to attack, take, or win over by storm" ("by storm" is defined as "by or as if by employing a bold swift frontal movement especially with the intent of defeating or winning over quickly"). In other words, like "invasion," "storm" is an expression normally used in the context of war.
We found no credible reporting that would indicate these two words aligned with the group's plans.
Instead, we learned that at least some of the men, women and children in the caravan planned to seek asylum in the U.S., according to both Mexico News Daily and Telemundo.
"An asylum seeker is a person who has left their country and is seeking protection from persecution and serious human rights violations in another country, but who hasn’t yet been legally recognized as a refugee and is waiting to receive a decision on their asylum claim," according to the human rights group Amnesty International.
In the bigger picture, the total annual number of U.S.-Mexico border encounters with migrants since 2020 has increased every year, according to figures provided by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Between January and September of 2023, the number of border encounters was recorded as 1,756,652.
Note: We contacted Reuters' senior correspondent Diego Oré via a DM on X to ask for more details about the video of the caravan and will update our story if we receive further details.