Thousands of Migrants Illegally Crossed the Texas Border this Week

Hundreds of migrants sitting along the El Paso-Mexican borderPhoto byFox News

Thousands of migrants are waiting along the El Paso - Mexican border. Hundreds of others attempted to cross the border illegally on Sunday night from Juarez.

Fox News reporter Bill Melugin was on the border and watched hundreds of migrants crossing the border illegally into El Paso.

The border crossings were also confirmed by El Paso Matters on December 9. The site stated about 1,500 from Central and South America arrived in Chihuahua, Mexico.

El Paso Matters commented:

"More than 1,000 migrants have begun crossing from Juarez into El Paso."

On Sunday night, the site confirmed about 1,500 migrants crossed the border. Most of the migrants were from Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba.

Mexico plans to hold the migrants in their country since Article 42 prevents legal immigration. The Trump-era policy is set to end on December 21.

On Tuesday, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas is visiting El Paso. Mayorkas will talk to Customs and Border Patrol agents, local officials and organizations, and review the current operations.

Mayorkas will get a close-up on migrant updates such as these.

Last week, almost 800 migrants were released from federal custody. A border patrol spokesperson said 286 migrants were released on Saturday and 498 migrants were released on Sunday.

Just last Monday, El Paso bussed about 100 migrants to Denver, Colorado who were taken in by the city.

Representative Escobar said the city has access to $10 million

U.S. Representative Veronica Escobar said El Paso has money to tap in to handle the migrant crisis.

She told Fox 14:

“There is funding immediately available that can be tapped into that is in possession of the City of El Paso that we believe is worthy of consideration.”

Escobar added:

“It’s my understanding the City of El Paso has $10 million in the bank in American Rescue Plan money that they’ve had for some time.”

“That American Rescue Plan money can more than likely be used to prevent homelessness and to shelter people who are on the street regardless of status.”

"The purpose is dealing with an emergency, and from what I heard from the Office of Emergency Management is they are expecting an emergency.”

El Paso Mayor Oscar Leeser has wanted the Federal government to pay for the services the city has used to pay for supporting and bussing migrants.

Maybe the city will dip into this fund after Title 42 ends on December 21. Migrants are aware of this date and there will likely be a large number of migrants who cross the Texas-Mexican border.

The mayor’s office stated:

“Funds designated to the City of El Paso from the Coronavirus State and Local Fiscal Recovery Funds (SLFRF) program, a part of the American Rescue Plan, to support state, local, and Tribal governments across the country in their response to and recovery from the COVID-19 public health emergency should not be reallocated to other federal issues when we are still dealing with an increase in COVID, Flu and RSV, and our hospitals are nearing capacity.

We need to be smart stewards of that designated money as we all know how critical that funding was as we went through our worst COVID scenario, which wasn’t that long ago. We have submitted reimbursement requests to the federal government for our assistance on the migrant federal issue and based on our conversations we are confident those funds will be received.

We thank the Congresswoman for her continued support, and we appreciate all her efforts on our behalf on this federal issue which is under her purview.”

Do you think El Paso can handle an influx of migrants in the next week when Title 42 ends?