Illegals say they've given up trying to cross the border since Trump won the election

Ed comment: Just SAYING it and threatening to do it, made it happen? Partially that's probably true. A show of intent and a strong will actually goes a long way, but the wall MUST be built. Whatever happens, the wall must go up. Trump can not flake on this most vital issue. Destroy Obamacare. Dismantle TPP and so forth. Lot's of good can come out of Trump in the White House. 

When would-be immigrants Bernardino and Samuel got word in Mexico of the election of Donald Trump, they immediately gave up their plans to cross illegally into the United States.

The rhetoric that originally fueled the billionaire populist's rise to power was built around his ambitious promises to deport the 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the US and to build a 'big, beautiful, powerful wall' along the border with Mexico.

Now, with the New York Republican's stunning victory Tuesday, fear and uncertainty are surging among undocumented immigrants. 

Will their workplaces be raided? Will there be mass expulsions? Greater obstacles to gaining legal status? What will happen? No one knows.

Samantha Yanez had not caught a wink of sleep. She arrived in the US at the age of six and now, at 21, she knows no other reality.

But she has no papers. Because she arrived as a child, she was granted temporary legal status by executive order of President Barack Obama.

But Trump has sharply criticized that program and could end it when he takes office in January.

'It's as if I didn't have a country; I'm a foreigner in the only country I know,' Samantha said, her voice quaking.

'I'm insecure. I feel anger, sadness -- betrayed by the American dream,' she added.

Bernardino, a 34-year-old Honduran who declined to give his last name, was looking for a 'coyote' to help him slip into the United States near the border city of Tijuana when he abandoned his plan. So did 18-year-old Samuel, a Salvadoran.

Both men said they feared that if they are caught, their family members living north of the border might suffer.

'Imagine if they stop me, after a while my family living over there would have problems.