DEL RIO, Texas — Haitian migrant families who illegally crossed the southern border and lived in a makeshift camp beneath an international bridge are being released into the United States, contradicting the Biden administration’s claims that they would be removed from the country.
Border Patrol released just over a dozen Haitian migrants at a gas station Wednesday evening. Large government-contracted buses drop off families twice a day at a gas station on a busy commercial road in the middle of town.
The buses come from processing centers throughout the region where migrants who have been waiting for days under the Del Rio-Acuna International Bridge are transported and processed into the system. From there, they are either released into the U.S. if they make a credible claim of fear returning to their home country or flown back to their country of origin.
TWO HAITIAN MIGRANTS BITE ICE OFFICERS ON DEPORTATION FLIGHT
Greyhound buses arrive at this gas station at 11:30 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. daily. The buses take passengers directly to San Antonio, Texas, roughly two and a half hours away.
On-site support assists migrants on buses from the Val Verde Border Humanitarian Coalition. Two volunteers were present at the Stripes gas station Wednesday evening.
The Greyhound bus pulled in at 5:35 p.m., and a white boarded-up school bus pulled in several minutes later with detainees onboard — moments away from being out of federal custody. Just over a dozen people stepped off the white bus and walked across the lot to board the commercial vehicle.
Two days earlier, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told reporters at a press conference at the bridge that “individuals and families are subject to border restrictions, including expulsion.”
“Irregular migration poses a significant threat to the health and welfare of border communities and to the lives of the migrants themselves and should not be attempted. If you come to the United States illegally, you will be returned,” Mayorkas said.
While the U.S. government said it would fly up to three planes of Haitian migrants back to Haiti daily, it has fallen below its promise due to violence on the flights.
In two incidents this week, Haitian migrants assaulted federal law enforcement on the plane, biting them. The two flights were canceled before making it to the runway at Laughlin Air Force Base in Del Rio.
Under a public health policy imposed at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, families are to be returned across the border immediately if they are encountered by Border Patrol.
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However, some Mexican states have refused to accept migrant families, forcing the Biden administration to detain many families and subsequently release them into the U.S. — sometimes without paperwork mandating they appear in immigration court for illegally crossing the border.
Haitian migrant families released by federal immigration authorities depart Del Rio. They are allowed to travel anywhere in the US. pic.twitter.com/uuXG4X515X
— Anna Giaritelli (@Anna_Giaritelli) September 23, 2021
