Greg Abbott: Texas Governor Sends Hundreds of Police Vehicles to Border to Create “Wall of Steel” in Front of Migrants

A kilometer-long barrier of police vehicles along the border. The Governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, took another step forward in his display of heavy hand in the face of the latest immigration crisis. The Republican politician has stepped up security around the bridge that connects Del Río and Ciudad Acuña, in Mexico, and has ordered the deployment of hundreds of patrols to “create a wall of steel,” he said, and contain the thousands of migrants. Haitians crowding the banks of the Rio Grande. The drastic measure adds to the dramatic images of the chases and captures of border agents, which will be investigated by the Department of Homeland Security.

The intransigence shown by Abbott, faithful to former President Donald Trump and one of the main defenders of his wall project, is also part of the search for a political confrontation with Joe Biden. This Wednesday the governor maintained that he had to reinforce the police system “in the absence of the federal government.” “Texas is securing the border,” he proclaimed, while one of his strong men, Lieutenant Christopher Olivarez, from the State Department of Public Security, warned: “We are not catching them to free them, what we are doing is catching them and putting them in the jail”.

Behind this overacting – to which is added on the one hand the request for the declaration of a state of emergency in Texas and on the other the outrage at Abbott’s heavy hand – the drama of the nearly 15,000 Haitian migrants a week ago crossed the border does not stop. The Biden Administration has actually already started the deportation. Dozens of people have been returned to Haiti and, in the absence of a definition about the operation, hundreds more await their transfer to other countries such as Chile or Brazil. The migrants left South America after Washington extended the deadlines to qualify for a temporary protection program known as TPS on August 3. The measure only affects Haitians who are already in the United States, but it caused a kind of so-called effect as it already happened at the end of 2020, after the defeat of Trump and the expectations generated by the new Democratic Administration.

The migration emergency represents a new humanitarian challenge for Mexico, which has been facing a crisis on the southern border for months. The Secretary of Foreign Relations, Marcelo Ebrard, declared that the migrants “are not requesting to be refugees in Mexico, except for a small percentage. What they are asking is that the passage to the United States be allowed free ”. Even so, the border crossing of Ciudad Acuña, in the State of Coahuila, runs the risk of becoming a funnel as has already occurred in other border municipalities. Ebrard has already spoken by phone with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and the two met for a meeting this weekend during the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

Blinken has also spoken with the Prime Minister of Haiti, Ariel Henry, to address “safe repatriation and the challenges of irregular migration.” The Caribbean country, mired in a permanent crisis for decades, faces one of the worst moments in recent years after suffering a devastating earthquake in August. That tragedy adds to the deep political instability generated by the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse in July.

Mexico, which is both the entry point for migratory flows from Central America and the exit to the United States, calls for a greater economic commitment from Washington and more regional involvement so as not to bear the full weight of the crises. This same week the president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, returned to Biden to request new investments in social programs. The White House, however, has another approach to cooperation, which makes the disbursement of funds contingent on the performance of the recipient countries. In any case, the US authorities, starting with Vice President Kamala Harris and Blinken himself, assure that they are seeking formulas for collaboration with the governments of the region. “Irregular migration poses serious risks for migrants and their families. It is a challenge that we are working with our counterparts in the region, “said the Secretary of State after speaking with his Mexican counterpart.

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