Customs and Border Protection deployed additional agents to the southern border on Thursday in an effort to keep sick illegal aliens from spreading the coronavirus, according to a Center for Immigration Studies report.
These 400 to 1,000 additional agents will assist Border Patrol officers in arresting and deporting “got-aways,” the illegal aliens who slip into the American interior.
The coronavirus has given immigration agencies greater incentive to ensure that sick illegal aliens do not spread COVID-19 among citizens and illegal aliens who live in border states.
An anonymous CBP official told CIS that the surge in immigration officers is to “mitigate public health impacts on the American public amid the ongoing global pandemic” and to stop “the Covid-19 public health risk posed if these illegal entry attempts continue unabated.”
Acting CBP Commissioner Mark Morgan said illegal aliens, who are coming in higher numbers during the summer, are entering the United States “for their own economic endeavors,” without any concern about spreading the virus.
“They’re running. They’re fighting. They’re doing everything that they can to avoid apprehension,” Morgan said Aug. 6 at a press conference.
“Even though some of the illegal aliens know, or highly suspect, that they have Covid . . . they’re still coming,” he said. “They’re exposing everyone they come in contact with during their journey, as they illegally try to enter this country.”
The agents will serve on 30-day deployments to two areas in Texas, the Laredo and Rio Grande Valley Border Patrol sectors.
Morgan said CBP agents are at risk when they apprehend infected illegal aliens. Ten agents have died from the coronavirus.
Hospitals in the south-Texas area have had a high number of patients with life-threatening cases, to such an extent that their services are being overwhelmed.
These hospitals have had add to expend additional resources in sending critically ill patients to hospitals in Amarillo, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and other cities.
Right across the border, Mexican hospitals in Matamoros, Reynosa, and Nuevo Laredo have not been able to keep up with the number of infected and dying patients, Mexico News Daily reported.
Another report from the Center for Immigration Studies found that high numbers of COVID-19 cases in border states may have been caused by illegal immigration.
On-the-ground hospital workers have reported that they are treating Mexican patients who either legally or illegally immigrated into the United States for the purpose of seeking treatment.
“According to my patients, they are coming over from Mexico because they’re not getting treated in Mexico,” said Megan Hill, a nurse in Riverside County, California. “They are flying helicopters every hour — bam, bam, bam — constantly flying them. It’s definitely happening.”
Hill also said that case numbers are high because health officials are double-counting illegal aliens.
“Our county is counting these people as [new positives in] Riverside County. They are not. They have tested positive already in the county of San Diego,” she said. “They’re flying them over to the county of Riverside, so if they’re going to do that why is Riverside taking those counts?”
