RSS - Posts
Developments
Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) Office of Professional Responsibility shared a report on Border Patrol agents’ participation in the delayed response to the 2022 school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, not far from the Del Rio-Eagle Pass border. As the New York Times described the report’s findings, “border agents had been just as confused and delayed as dozens of other state and local law enforcement agents inside the school by the chaotic and mostly leaderless response.”
- “U.S. Customs and Border Protection Releases Findings of Its Investigation of the Response to the Mass Shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas” (U.S. Customs and Border Protection, September 12, 2024).
- Edgar Sandoval, J. David Goodman, “Border Agents Made Decision to Confront Gunman in Uvalde, Report Finds” (The New York Times, September 12, 2024).
The Haitian Times and Reuters reported about fear and threats spreading through Haitian immigrant communities around the United States after presidential candidate Donald Trump amplified false claims that migrants from Haiti were consuming people’s pets in an Ohio city. USA Today recalled that “pet-eating” is an old racist trope; the Intercept found a pattern of especially virulent discrimination against Haitian migrants in the United States.
- Macollvie J. Neel, “Haitian families in Ohio under attack as racist claims spread” (The Haitian Times, September 11, 2024).
- Andy Sullivan, Gabriella Borter, Ted Hesson, “Haitian Americans Fear for Their Safety After Trump Repeats False Claims About Immigrants and Pets” (Reuters, Reuters, September 13, 2024).
- Deborah Barfield Berry, Karen Weintraub, Lauren Villagran, “Immigrants-Eat-Pets Trope Is a Century-Old Stereotype and ‘Very Old Racism’” (USA Today, September 12, 2024).
- Jonah Valdez, “America’s Racist, Xenophobic, and Highly Specific Fear of Haiti” (The Intercept, September 12, 2024).
U.S. law enforcement officials interviewed by Border Report confirmed a Mexican police claim that traffickers have been using drones to move drugs from the border state of Chihuahua, including between more densely populated areas along the border between Ciudad Juárez and El Paso.
- Julian Resendiz, “Juarez Traffickers Using Drones to Drop Drugs in el Paso” (Border Report, September 12, 2024).
The House Homeland Security Committee’s Republican majority has scheduled a hearing for September 18 entitled, “A Country Without Borders: How Biden-Harris’ Open-Borders Policies Have Undermined Our Safety and Security.”
- “Media Advisory: Chairman Green Announces Hearing on the Biden-Harris Administration’s Catastrophic Border Record, Impacts on the Safety of Americans” (Committee on Homeland Security, U.S. House of Representatives, September 12, 2024).
- Anna Giaritelli, “House Republicans to Hold Biden-Harris Feet to Fire in Latest Border Crisis Hearing” (The Washington Examiner, September 12, 2024).
Analyses and Feature Stories
A new WOLA commentary amplified calls for a federal inquiry into Texas’s frequent use of soldiers (National Guard personnel) to confront unarmed asylum seekers, often violently. Because it involves military personnel on U.S. soil, appears to violate use-of-force standards and best practices for controlling disturbances, and is physically pushing protection-seeking migrants into Mexico, WOLA found this to be one of the most troubling aspects of Texas’s state “Operation Lone Star” border security crackdown.
- Adam Isacson, Ana Lucia Verduzco, “Soldiers Confronting Migrants: Texas’s Dangerous Precedent” (Washington Office on Latin America, September 12, 2024).
Newsweek looked at the numbers and spoke to experts who questioned Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s (R) claim that Operation Lone Star has driven down the number of undocumented migrants there. The decline is border-wide.
- James Bickerton, “Greg Abbott Says Texas Border Is Solved—Is He Right?” (Newsweek, September 13, 2024).
In an interview with New York Times podcast host Ezra Klein, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas defended the Biden administration’s border security and migration record, including its recent moves to restrict access to asylum at the border.
- Ezra Klein, “The Real ‘Border Czar’ Defends the Biden-Harris Record” (The New York Times, September 13, 2024).
On the Right
- Sarah Arnold, “First Biden-Harris Cbp One Bus Carrying Illegal Aliens Arrives at Border” (TownHall, September 12, 2024).
- James Bickerton, “Greg Abbott Says Texas ‘Won’t Back Down’ After Migrant Buoy Barrier Win” (Newsweek, September 12, 2024).