Border Patrol using cellphones to process migrants in overwhelmed South Texas

August 2024 · 3 minute read

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Facing overwhelming numbers of illegal migrants crossing into Texas, the US Border Patrol has announced it’s turning to cellphone technology to help speed up processing.

The agents are using mobile phones that’ll give them the ability to immediately log biometrics and other information — instead of waiting hours, or even days, until border crossers can be transferred to a processing center.

The end of Title 42 on May 11 has the Border Patrol gearing up for a massive influx of migrants.

In Brownsville, a small city near the Gulf of Mexico, a mob of 2,000 migrants crossed the international boundary on Tuesday — bringing the total number of border jumpers just this week to nearly 5,000, according to the Border Report.

Border Patrol agents continued to process the hordes in a baseball field near Texas Southmost College — an area lined with tents where the processing is taking place.

The procedure screens entrants for criminal backgrounds, takes their biometrics and officially records their entry into the country.

Those eligible to stay in the US are given paperwork and released, while the rest are returned to Mexico or sent back to their home countries.

The Border Patrol is using special cellphones to help speed up the time it takes them to process migrants. @USBPChiefRGV
A Border Patrol agent in Brownsville, part of the Rio Grande Valley sector of the agency, processes a migrant with the use of special cellphones. @USBPChiefRGV

Brownsville is just one of several Texas hot spots, with El Paso leading the nation in migrant apprehensions, the feds reported. So far this fiscal year, the west Texas city has seen 265,000 migrants cross the border.

Mayor Oscar Leeser plans to issue a disaster declaration in the coming days to prepare for the crush of migrants expected to cross the border on May 11. The pandemic-era policy currently allows the Border Patrol to immediately return asylum seekers from certain countries to Mexico, without hearing their asylum claims.

Yesterday, Brownsville Station #USBP Agents encountered over 1,600 migrants entering illegally into the #USA in a 24-hour period. Huge Kudos to all our #RGV Border Patrol Agents who are working feverishly through this migrant influx!  💚🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/EA8xLz0EU3

— Chief Patrol Agent Gloria I. Chavez (@USBPChiefRGV) April 24, 2023

The state of emergency will go into effect in the coming days as up to 40,000 migrants have gathered just across the border in Juarez, Mexico.

Del Rio, Texas, is the second-busiest spot in the nation, but trailing El Paso just slightly.

Texas has borne the brunt of the border crisis, with 3.2 million migrants crossing into the state since 2021, according to US Customs and Border Protection, the parent agency of the Border Patrol.

Even though Title 42 ends on May 11, weary migrants who are sick of sleeping on the streets of Mexico have started to surrender themselves to the Border Patrol in cities across Texas. @Bensman Todd

Currently, shelters in El Paso, San Antonio and Houston are at capacity as migrants have started to surrender themselves to the Border Patrol. In San Antonio, migrants who have exceeded the number of days they can stay at the shelter have taken to sleeping at the airport.

New York City declared a state of emergency in October after 40,000 migrants, mostly from Texas, were bused into the Big Apple, putting even more strain on the city’s homeless shelters and services.

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