Migrants Crossing U.S. Southern Border Spike 900%, Violent Criminals Captured in the Mix
The number of migrants crossing into the U.S. illegally on the country's southern border is increasing every month.
The latest figures show nearly 179,000 encounters by the Border Patrol in April, which is a 900 percent increase since last year.
Another concern is the flood of unaccompanied minors at the border. Record numbers of children are arriving faster than they can be processed and placed in sponsor homes.
April was the second-busiest month on record for unaccompanied children encountered at the border — 17,171 were stopped — following March's all-time high of 18,960, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
There were about 50,000 people encountered in families in April. About one of every three families was expelled to Mexico. The rest were allowed to remain in the United States to seek asylum.
Being expelled carries no legal consequences, so many people try to cross multiple times.
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Fox News reported the Democratic mayor of a Texas border town said illegal aliens continue to flood across the Rio Grande from Mexico, overwhelming Border Patrol agents, and the local authorities.
Del Rio Mayor Bruno Lozano told the Fox News show "Your World" that recently a school near the border was forced into lockdown after more than a dozen illegal immigrants attempted to breach the property via a fence.
Del Rio is located just across the border from Acuna, Mexico.
"We had illegals attempting to traverse the perimeter fence at one of the local schools at the southern side of the city," said Lozano. "The school had to go on lockdown to make sure the students were safe. They heard helicopters overhead. We saw state troopers and sheriffs and police responding to that incident."
Meanwhile, Border Patrol agents apprehended two convicted child sex offenders trying to come across the border over the weekend, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced on Monday.
On Saturday evening, McAllen agents working near Abrams, Texas, apprehended a group of ten migrants, including one unaccompanied child, shortly after illegally entering the United States, the agency said. A criminal records check by agents revealed that a Salvadoran man within that group, Raul Sanchez-Sanchez, 28, was previously arrested by the Moses Lake Police Department in Washington for the rape of a child. In 2016, Sanchez-Sanchez was found guilty and sentenced to 34 months imprisonment and 36 months of community service.
In addition, early Monday morning, agents working near Anzalduas Park in south Mission, Texas, encountered another 49-year-old Salvadoran man who had illegally entered the country, according to the CPB. The man identified as, Rafael Rauda-Lopez, was transported to the McAllen Border Patrol Station where records checks revealed he had a previous arrest by the New York City Police Department for sexual contact with a 9-year-old female child in 2014. Rauda-Lopez was convicted in 2016 for sexual abuse in the second degree: sexual contact with a person less than 14 years old and was sentenced to one year in jail.
"Even with the spread of the COVID-19 virus, human smugglers continue to try these brazen attempts with zero regard for the lives they endanger nor to the health of the citizens of our great nation," the CBP said in their release. "The U.S. Border Patrol agents of the Rio Grande Valley Sector will continue to safeguard the nation and community against these criminal elements."
