Video obtained by Fox News shows law enforcement in Texas arresting approximately 10 illegal immigrants hidden in an underground drainage system — the latest of thousands of arrests of illegal migrants made in recent months in the Lone Star state.
Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) told Fox News that one of its troopers responded to a camera alert in Hidalgo and found approximately 10 illegal immigrants using the drainage system to evade authorities.
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The video shows Border Patrol on the scene removing them from the drain and taking them into custody.
In a statement, Texas DPS said it “remains committed in helping to secure our nation’s border by working with partner agencies in combating criminal activity and apprehending illegal immigrants who are illegally making entry into the state and across the country.”
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Texas has been one of the states hardest hit by the crisis at the southern border, which has seen a surge in migration and more than 212,000 apprehensions in July alone.
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While the Biden administration has blamed root causes like violence and poverty in Central America, as well as policies by the Trump administration, Republicans in Texas and elsewhere have blamed the Biden administration’s rolling back of Trump-era border protections.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has announced a number of measures that Texas is taking to push back against the flood of illegal migration. A since-blocked order by Abbott allowed Texas troopers to pull over vehicles suspected of carrying illegal immigrants, and he has launched a project to build a wall at Texas’ southern border.
In March, the state launched Operation Lone Star which sends law enforcement to “high threat areas” along the border “to deny Mexican Cartels and other smugglers the ability to move drugs and people into Texas.”
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Texas DPS said in its statement that since then, it has made over 5,200 criminal arrests and apprehended over 64,000 illegal immigrants.
The state recently scored a significant legal victory against the Biden administration after the Supreme Court declined to place a stay on a federal court ruling that orders the federal government to re-implement the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) – a Trump-era policy that kept migrants in Mexico as they awaited their hearings.