Faced with what he considers President Biden’s inaction to protect the Southwest border from the flow of immigrants, Texas Governor Greg Abbott estimates that in a year, once Title 42 ends, more than 6 million people will cross into the United States.
The estimate was made based on the projection of the federal government, which expects an average of 18,000 encounters with migrants to occur daily as of May 11, when the sanitary measure that allows foreigners to be expelled under the pretext of preventing them from spreading the virus expires. Covid-19 in the US.
“Get out your calculator and do the math. If you were to average that daily for an entire year, that would mean more than six million people would cross the border in a single year,” Abbott said during a speech Monday to a group of sheriffs from Texas and other states in McAllen.
The state president also announced that he mobilized special units to the southern border to help the United States Border Patrol.
“We are working on rapid response teams that can respond to the challenges we see at the border. We had a conference call last night, where we activated one of these rapid response teams to send it to El Paso,” he added.
“And they’ve already conducted operational maneuvers today, even before I got here, to make sure that we’re responding more aggressively to the large number of people who have tried to enter El Paso illegally,” Abbott said.
Speaking to the Southwest Border Sheriffs Coalition, Abbott told representatives from 33 counties that Texas will send units to police the border and assist deputies.
El Paso led the nation in migrant encounters for the sixth straight month in March.
Border agents in El Paso have seen a surge in asylum seekers turning themselves in at the border wall following a fire at a Juarez, Mexico, detention center that claimed 40 lives. More than 1,000 South and Central Americans turned themselves in at the border wall on March 29, and other groups have followed since.
Another factor driving the wave is the seasonal surge of Mexicans and Central Americans seeking to avoid detention by trying to obtain farm and construction jobs in the interior of the United States.
Abbott also announced assistance for ranchers along the Texas-Mexico border whose land has been destroyed or damaged by human and migrant smugglers.
The Republican governor has been especially aggressive on border security, speaking out about the Biden administration’s response to the matter. His initiative Operation Lone Star has brought immigrants into Democratic strongholds to draw attention to the crisis and has deployed National Guard soldiers to help border officials.
Title 42, a Trump-era public health order, could expire on May 11. The order gives the federal government the power to expel migrants at the southern border. Currently it is only allowed to prevent communicable diseases.
The order has been in effect since March 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic and will end on May 11 in conjunction with the pandemic public health emergency. Its imminent end has renewed fears among lawmakers and officials that the end of the order will be followed by a new wave of immigrants.
“Texas has been dealing with the border since the days when Bush was governor and Perry was governor,” Abbott told the sheriffs, to whom he promoted his Operation Lone Star, which seeks to stop illegal immigrants and drugs crossing the border.
“Texas has done more than any state in the history of the United States of America to respond to border challenges,” he added.
The attendees came not only from Texas, but from different parts of the country, including New Mexico, Arizona, Ohio, and even Idaho.
“Well, we’re all part of a group that’s fighting the same fight all over the United States, especially on the Southwest border,” said David Black, sheriff of Otero County, New Mexico, which is based in Alamogordo and borders El Paso. , Texas.
“We have been inundated with transnational criminal activity. And we’re trying to fight that,” added Roy Boyd, the Goliad County, Texas, sheriff.
Abbott has boasted of numerous trips here to the Rio Grande Valley, focusing largely on the issue of immigration.
“From New Mexico, our Governor is not as supportive as Governor Abbott is here in Texas. So I think it’s very important that they see firsthand what’s going on. I think it’s important that he has to go to the border,” Black said.
“I think it’s important for the governor to come here and be in touch with the people who actually live in these communities along the border and find out firsthand exactly what’s going on. So that the solutions that are developed come from the people who live here, not from the people of Austin,” Boyd said.
