AUSTIN, Texas — U.S. Border Patrol facilities in El Paso are overflowing with thousands of illegal immigrants in custody and scores more waiting outside in a declining situation that is expected to get worse in the coming days and lead to mass street releases.
Internal planning documents reviewed by the Washington Examiner Monday morning revealed that Border Patrol’s El Paso Sector, just one of nine southern border regions, had 4,500 immigrants in custody Saturday.
<mediadc-video-embed data-state="{"cms.site.owner":{"_ref":"00000161-3486-d333-a9e9-76c6fbf30000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b93390000"},"cms.content.publishDate":1670859305829,"cms.content.publishUser":{"_ref":"0000016c-727c-d9b2-af6f-f7ff06a00003","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"cms.content.updateDate":1670859305829,"cms.content.updateUser":{"_ref":"0000016c-727c-d9b2-af6f-f7ff06a00003","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"rawHtml":"
var _bp = _bp||[]; _bp.push({ "div": "Brid_70859292", "obj": {"id":"27789","width":"16","height":"9","video":"1203497"} }); ","_id":"00000185-06f9-d1e2-abcf-96f9a81e0000","_type":"2f5a8339-a89a-3738-9cd2-3ddf0c8da574"}”>Video Embed
MOTORCYCLIST CRASHES INTO BORDER PATROL CHECKPOINT, SERIOUSLY INJURING ARIZONA AGENT
Another 750 immigrants who came across the border as one group were waiting outdoors because facilities were already well over capacity.
“Could be next Del Rio,” a senior Customs and Border Protection official wrote in an email to the Washington Examiner Sunday evening.
The comment was in reference to the sudden surge of primarily Haitian immigrants who came across the border into Del Rio, Texas, in September 2021 and set up a massive camp under the international bridge because Border Patrol lacked space to take the more than 15,000 people into custody.
The south-central Texas city of Eagle Pass has been ground zero in the border crisis over the past year, but even its unprecedented numbers cannot compare to those of El Paso.
Agents in the 30,000-person remote town Eagle Pass have taken into custody an average of 1,800 to 2,000 immigrants a day, with more than half being released daily into the community. But the Eagle Pass numbers pale in comparison to what El Paso faces.
Over the past 48 hours, Border Patrol has apprehended 16,000 illegal immigrants nationwide and seized $97 million worth of narcotics at the border, according to a statement issued Monday.
A senior Border Patrol agent involved in the response said the rush is likely the result of immigrants attempting to get into the United States before pandemic public health policy Title 42 ends next week.
“They are trying to cross now due to T42 ending soon, which is going to make the process of getting released longer,” the second official wrote in a text message Monday. “The system that’s in place won’t be able to accommodate thousands of people on a daily basis.”
Under Title 42, immigrants from Mexico and Central American countries are easily expelled at the border, while immigrants from countries further away have largely been released into the U.S.
When Title 42 ends on Dec. 20, Border Patrol will not be able to immediately return people across the border and will arrest each illegal immigrant and detain them.
However, Border Patrol does not have the capacity to detain immigrants for as long as it takes to process people under normal procedures, as opposed to now when immigrants in custody are typically released within 24 to 48 hours and facilities can constantly cycle people in and out of custody.
In 2019, conditions at Border Patrol facilities in El Paso came under national scrutiny as immigrants detained for weeks in cells, held outside in the heat, and unaccompanied children held at a station in Clint, Texas, were poorly cared for. Since then, Congress funded the creation of a massive processing center in El Paso, but even with that addition, facilities cannot keep up.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Border Patrol is flying immigrants on government-operated aircraft to other lesser-impacted areas on the border for people to be processed and released or expelled and ease the burden on El Paso.
CBP and its sub-agency, the Border Patrol, appear to be responding quickly to the worsening situation in West Texas. Agents in at least one other sector were asked Saturday to volunteer for weeklong deployments to El Paso to help regain control of the border amid the irregular migration event.
