Migrant caravan captured the world’s attention in 2018

For a month and half, a caravan of more than 6,000 Central American migrants captured the world’s attention as they headed for the U.S. border fleeing oppressive poverty and gang violence.

In reality their numbers equaled just a few days of the average estimated immigration flow to the United States. But by moving en masse, they protected themselves from those who would seek to do them harm along the way _ while incurring the Twitter wrath of President Donald Trump, who sought to make the caravan a political issue in midterm elections.

Far removed from U.S. politics, migrants in the caravan were more focused on getting through each grueling day. That routinely meant waking before dawn and walking or catching rides to cover the approximately 2,800 miles from San Pedro Sula, Honduras, to Tijuana, Mexico, across from San Diego.

Along the way generous but overwhelmed communities tried to keep them fed.

AP photographers documented the journey and its physical and emotional toll, as well as some of the migrants' attempts to breach the Guatemala-Mexico and Mexico-U.S. borders.

The migrants' bodies were ravaged by the long hours trudging through heat and cold, as well as respiratory infections that spread easily among an exhausted population living in close quarters. Children, as is often the case, suffered the most. Families carrying, coaxing and pushing sick or exhausted kids along rural highways resulted in some of the most indelible images.

Since early December most of the migrants have been stalled in Tijuana as U.S. authorities slowly process asylum claims that were backlogged in the thousands even before the caravan arrived. Many are facing wait times of months for an opportunity to request asylum in the United States, while others are finding jobs and trying to settle in Mexico.

With part of the U.S. government shut down over Trump's insistence on funding for a border wall, their future and that of those following behind remains uncertain.

Migrants tired of waiting to cross into Mexico, jumped from a border bridge fence into the Suchiate River, in Tecun Uman, Guatemala, Friday, Oct. 19, 2018. (AP Photo/Oliver de Ros)

A group of Central American migrants cross the Suchiate River aboard a raft made out of tractor inner tubes and wooden planks, on the the border between Guatemala and Mexico, in Ciudad Hidalgo, Mexico, Saturday, Oct. 20, 2018. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)

A Honduran migrant mother and child cower in fear as they are surrounded by Mexican Federal Police in riot gear, at the border crossing in Ciudad Hidalgo, Mexico, Friday, Oct. 19, 2018. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)

Central American migrants, part of the caravan hoping to reach the U.S. border, get a ride on a truck, in Celaya, Mexico, Sunday, Nov. 11, 2018. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

U.S.-bound Central American migrants get on to a truck for a a free ride, as part of a thousands-strong caravan moving through Puebla, Mexico, Monday, Nov. 5, 2018. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

Migrants discuss their journey using a map posted inside the sports complex where thousands of migrants have been camped out for several days in Mexico City, Friday, Nov. 9, 2018. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Members of a US-bound migrant caravan cross a bridge between the Mexican states of Chiapas and Oaxaca after federal police briefly blocked them outside the town of Arriaga, Saturday, Oct. 27, 2018. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

Volunteers from the Mexican Red Cross treat the blistered and cut feet of Central American migrants as a caravan of thousands stops for the night in Arriaga, Mexico, Friday, Oct. 26, 2018. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Honduran migrant Leticia Nunes holds her daughter Mailyn as she stands with a small group of other migrants in front of a line of Mexican police in riot gear, when they tried to cross the Chaparral border crossing in Tijuana, Mexico, Thursday, Nov. 22, 2018. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

Migrants ride in the back of a truck, as a thousands-strong caravan of Central American migrants slowly makes its way toward the U.S. border, between Pijijiapan and Arriaga, Mexico, Friday, Oct. 26, 2018. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

Jason, 11, sleeps using a toy ball as pillow during a break from walking early morning on the road that connects Pijijiapan with Arriaga, Mexico, on Oct. 26, 2018. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)

A Honduran migrant holds up a replica of the Black Christ of Esquipulas as a caravan of migrants making their way to the U.S. arrives to Esquipulas, Guatemala, Monday, Oct. 15, 2018. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)

Members of the U.S. military install multiple tiers of concertina wire along the banks of the Rio Grande near the Juarez-Lincoln Bridge at the U.S.-Mexico border, Friday, Nov. 16, 2018, in Laredo, Texas. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

A Honduran migrant helps a young girl cross to the American side of the border wall, in Tijuana, Mexico, Sunday, Dec. 2, 2018. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)

Authorities hold a Honduran migrant who was rescued after he tried to cross the US border by the sea in Tijuana beach, Mexico, Thursday, Nov. 29, 2018. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)

A border patrol officer is overpassed by migrants running while others already climbing the U.S. border fence jump inside the United States to San Diego, from Tijuana, Mexico, Tuesday, Dec. 25, 2018. (AP Photo/Daniel Ochoa de Olza)

Honduran migrant Joel Mendez, 22, feeds his eight-month-old son Daniel as his partner Yesenia Martinez, 24, crawls through a hole under the U.S. border wall, in Tijuana, Mexico, Friday, Dec. 7, 2018. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

In a photo taken from the Tijuana, Mexico, side of the border, Honduran migrants react as they surrender to the U.S. Border Patrol after crossing the border wall in to the United States, Sunday, Dec. 2, 2018. (AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)

People from the U.S. side of the border wave at those on the Mexico side, at the border structure in San Diego, Friday, Nov. 23, 2018. (AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)