How did the rise of gangs happen so quickly in immigrant suburban communities?
Garland: Mara Salvatrucha-13 (MS-13) and 18th Street might have formed anyway if the immigration system in this country was functional, but one of the main reasons they’ve grown so big, so fast can be directly linked to bad immigration policy. (Ed Note: MS-13 can now be found in 42 states with an estimated 10,000 members. 18th Street has 30,000 to 50,000 members in 20 states. The FBI says MS-13 and 18th Street are the fastest growing and most violent of the nation’s street gangs.) The gangs originally formed among Hispanic immigrants marginalized in Los Angeles. A lot them were refugees from the civil wars (in Central America) funded with American money who were denied refugee status, so they were traumatized people left living on the fringes of society with not a lot of options for upward mobility – and the same type of scenario is still going on today. U.S. immigration agents pick up about 8,000 kids illegally crossing the border alone each year. Many of those kids are going to meet
