“The Department has received a request for assistance from the Department of Health and Human Services to temporarily house unaccompanied migrant children,” Kirby said. “They’ve asked specifically for use of Joint Base San Antonio, Lackland, Texas and Fort Bliss, Texas. We have just received this request, so I don’t have much more detail than that. We’ll analyze that and evaluate it just like we would any other request for assistance.”
The US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) said on Tuesday that it is processing apprehended migrant children at its holding facilities as quickly as possible.
CBP released photos and videos of migrant children being processed at two facilities at the Texas border cities of Donna and El Paso. The footage shows large groups of migrant children and women in temporary holding facilities awaiting processing.
Migrants are seen kept in separate plastic pods inside facilities that only look similar to those steel cages used under the previous Trump and Obama administrations. Migrants are fed and provided foil blankets and floor mats on which to rest.
CBP said it will continue to discourage outside visitors to the facilities as part of its efforts to protect the health and safety of the employees as well as the migrant children.
The response from CBP comes on the heels of leaked photos showing overcrowded facilities holding migrant children and mounting pressure from media outlets to gain access into these facilities to report about the poor situation.
Last week, President Joe Biden in an interview with ABC News said that the vast majority of undocumented migrants currently crossing the US southern border have been turned away. Biden advised asylum-seeking migrants, mostly from Central America, not to make the journey to the United States and encouraged them to apply for asylum in their home countries once the US government sets up local facilities to process claims.
The Biden administration has been required to open at least four temporary care facilities to hold an influx of migrant children currently overwhelming US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) facilities in hot spots along the US southern border.
A majority of migrants apprehended at the border are fleeing poverty and violence in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras, according to reports.
CBP data shows that some 317,590 migrants have been expelled or turned away since October 2020 under a Trump-era public health-related policy known as Title 42. The highest number of migrants expelled in 2021 occurred in February, with 70,183 expulsions.
The data also shows that 100,441 migrants were apprehended at the US southern border in February, a significant increase from the 78,442 migrants apprehended in January. A total of 396,958 migrants have been apprehended at the US southern border in fiscal year 2021, which began in October 2020.