US Border Patrol agents apprehended more than 67,000 illegal immigrants pouring into the country last week as video revealed a grotesque stain of wet clothes, drugs and other trash left behind by the migrants, dubbed “the mattress”.
Frontier reporter Todd Bensman documented the large patch of abandoned soggy clothing and spoke with a Texas National Guardsman to explain why agency members colloquially refer to it as “the mattress.”
Bensman can be heard saying that in addition to discarded clothing, the pile contains feces, medicine, diapers and syringes.
The guard, who was heard but not seen in Bensman’s video, told him the pile got his nickname because it’s soft and there’s no way to tell what you might find inside. inside.
“It’s sweet but… you don’t know what you get if you fall in it,” the agent said of the stack located on the shore opposite Matamoros – a town in Mexico across from Brownsville.
Last Thursday, Title 42, the Trump-era immigration restriction designed to prevent the spread of COVID-19 was lifted. In the days leading up to the expiry of this policy, border agents saw a massive influx of migrants trying to enter the country illegally just under the wire.
As a result, the number of illegal migrants crossing the border last week rose to almost 70,000 from 50,000 the previous week.
Now Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas says lifting Title 42 is clamping down on the number of migrants trying to enter the country.
Before the policy ended Thursday night, more than 10,000 migrants a day were crossing the border. Mayorkas said the number fell to 6,300 encounters on Friday and around 4,200 on Saturday.
“Over the past two days, the United States Border Patrol has experienced a 50% drop in encounters compared to what we were experiencing earlier in the week prior to the end of Title 42 at midnight Thursday,” a he told CNN’s “State” host. of the Union’
” It is still early. We are on the third day. But we have been planning this transition for months and months.
It remains to be seen whether the numbers will drop, as Mayorkas predicted, but on Friday US Border Patrol chief Raul Ortiz shared a tweet shedding light on what his officers have encountered over the past seven days. .
Migrants wait to board a bus in downtown Brownsville, Texas, to arrive at their final destination in the United States Thursday, May 11, 2023 as Title 42 draws to a close
More than $83,000 in cash was seized by Border Patrol agents last week
Migrants line up to receive food outside a processing center on May 11, 2023 in Brownsville, Texas. On May 11, 2023, the United States will officially end its 40-month Covid-19 emergency, also rejecting Title 42, a tool that has been used to stop millions of migrants from entering the country.
Shocking video shows huge pile of trash and wet clothes dubbed ‘the mattress’ thrown away by migrants crossing illegally in Brownsville
Nearly 500 pounds of drugs were seized by Border Patrol agents last week
56 pounds of Fentanyl were found and confiscated last week
Migrants walk toward a bus station after being released from a respite center on the Texas-Mexico border, Thursday, May 11, 2023, in Brownsville, Texas
In this aerial photo taken on May 11, 2023, people push a float with migrants across the Rio Grande River to the United States from Mexico, in Brownsville, Texas
Ortiz wrote that three of his officers were assaulted, $83,557 in cash was seized, nearly 500 pounds of drugs were confiscated, including 56 pounds of fentanyl, and seven firearms were seized.
Five sex offenders, four gang members, two criminals and a subject with five warrants against him were also apprehended.
In addition to the 67,759 arrests, around 15,780 illegal migrants were counted as “runaways”, a term for illegal immigrants who were spotted crossing the border by officers or on camera, but were not caught. or dealt with by the authorities.
Statistics released by US Customs and Border Protection show that in March of this year, there were 257,910 nationwide encounters across all borders.
The March figures brought the total number of fixtures to 1,544,087 this year.
Current trends could see the total number of crossings break last year’s record of 2.76 million.
The latest numbers and the cancellation of Title 42 come after the Biden administration said it would set up migrant processing centers in Central and South America in a bid to speed up deportations and further deter migration. illegal immigration to the United States.
The first centers will be located in Colombia and Guatemala, two countries that have developed key stopping points for those wishing to travel to the border.
President Biden has also allowed army reserves to deploy to the southern border, as border patrol offices are woefully understaffed to process and process the number of migrants crossing the border.
One of the drug transports that was picked up by Border Patrol in the last week of April
Title 42 allowed for the expedited deportation of migrants from the United States amid the public health emergency during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Republicans and border hawks have been highly critical of the end of Title 42, saying there is no alternative to ensure the southern border is not overrun and even more submerged than it already is.
Internal projections show that migration to the southern border could increase by 10,000 to 13,000 a day now that the policy is lapsed.
But, so far, that’s not what Mayorkas says the agency he oversees is living for.
“We have communicated a vitally important message very clearly to people considering arriving at our southern border: there is a legal, safe and orderly way to get to the United States,” he said during from a Sunday morning appearance on ABC This Week.
“It is through the avenues that President Biden has expanded in an unprecedented way.
“And then there’s a consequence of not using those legal avenues, and that consequence is deportation from the United States, deportation and a five-year re-entry ban, and possible criminal prosecution. .”