EAGLE PASS, Texas — With just hours to go before the largest yet congressional visit arrives at the border in the small Texas town of Eagle Pass, a source within Customs and Border Protection tells Breitbart Texas what they will witness pales in comparison to the migrant surge and grossly overcrowded facilities experienced during the month of December. A nearby soft-sided processing facility designed to accommodate 1,000 migrants that has routinely held nearly 6,000 during the month is now holding less than 500.
According to the source, not authorized to speak to the media, the facility has been nearly emptied through daily migrant releases of nearly 1,500 daily into the small border community of Eagle Pass. At times, when non-government migrant shelters in the Del Rio Border Patrol Sector closed during the holidays or reached capacity, direct migrant releases onto the city streets were conducted to reduce the numbers.
Here is Eagle Pass just weeks ago vs. yesterday.
The Biden Administration decided to divert the flood of illegal immigrants to another location in order to keep them out of the camera shots during @HouseGOP’s visit to Eagle Pass. Don’t be fooled, they are still being released… pic.twitter.com/XzjPVq5xxB
— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) January 2, 2024
The source says the once-filled temporary staging area where thousands of migrants were held in an outdoor setting near the Camino Real International Bridge II is mostly empty due to recent enforcement actions in Mexico that have temporarily stemmed the flow of migrants into the city.
“After the latest visit by DHS Secretary Mayorkas with Mexican government officials, buses and planes carrying migrants south from the border are having an impact, as are train operations ongoing in Monterrey that have reduced the flow of migrants that was unabated in December,” the source told Breitbart Texas.
The source believes the relief is only temporary as the migrants are not being sent back to their home countries in large numbers. Moving them south only delays their arrival to border cities where the migrants will likely attempt to enter the United States in a few short weeks, the source explained.
“In September, we experienced the same phenomenon after significant media coverage and visits by congressional delegations and celebrity CEO Elon Musk. Intervention by Mexico at the behest of our government slowed things down. But the traffic returned a few short months later,” the source emphasized.
The Congressional visit, which will include 60 legislators, including Speaker of the House Mike Johnson and local representative Tony Gonzales, is set for Wednesday afternoon. The delegation will receive an operational brief from Texas Department of Public Safety Director Colonel Steven McCraw and other state law enforcement officials prior to a scheduled press conference on the banks of the Rio Grande.
The source says Mexican authorities will likely make sure there is little to see while the legislators visit the immediate border area. In December, as reported by Breitbart Texas, more than 70,000 migrants made landfall in the Del Rio Sector. Most entries centered around Eagle Pass and the outdoor staging site near the Camino Real International Bridge. The record-breaking influx of migrants prompted Customs and Border Protection to shut down cross-border rail operations at Eagle Pass, the second busiest rail port of entry in the state of Texas.
Although the rail line has since re-opened, one of two official ports of entry into Mexico from Eagle Pass remains shut. The closure of the port has devastated local businesses that rely on legitimate travelers for income during the busy holiday season. Wait times to cross into Eagle Pass reached nearly 12 hours at one point during the Christmas and New Year’s holiday season.
The influx also resulted in a decision by Customs and Border Protection to shut down Border Patrol highway checkpoints, a critical tier in the agency’s border security strategy. The highway checkpoints serve as the last line of defense for the Border Patrol to detect human smuggling and other cross-border crimes such as fentanyl smuggling.
As reported by Breitbart Texas, the increase in crossings frustrated city leaders who felt the current administration was failing to respond adequately to their pleas for assistance. The city’s Mayor Rolando Salinas, a Democrat, took to social media earlier this month to express his frustration with the surge of migrants flooding into his city. Describing the constant flow of migrants into the city as an immigration disaster, Salinas chided Department of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas for visiting Uvalde, Texas — a city 60 miles away from the border region — but failing to visit one of the busiest migrant crossing spots in Eagle Pass during the visit.
Randy Clark is a 32-year veteran of the United States Border Patrol. Prior to his retirement, he served as the Division Chief for Law Enforcement Operations, directing operations for nine Border Patrol Stations within the Del Rio, Texas, Sector. Follow him on Twitter @RandyClarkBBTX.
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