Border Patrol Agents Arrest 144 Illegal Immigrants Near Texas Border

Two separate stash house raids have resulted in the arrest of 144 illegal immigrants caught near the Texas border.

The latest raid took place Tuesday afternoon north of the border city of Mission, Texas. U.S. Border Patrol agents, along with Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Deputies and Precinct 4 Deputy Constables, carried out a “knock and talk,” Border Patrol spokesman Oscar Saldana said in an interview with Breitbart Texas.

“The information came from an interview with a subject in custody who provided a specific location on an address that was being used,” Saldana said.

Following up on the information, authorities went to the house and found the 68 illegal immigrants that they arrested.

That raid comes just one day after agents working alongside deputy constables arrested another group of 76 illegal immigrants north of the border city of Edinburg.

The earlier raid came under similar circumstances, when a series of interviews with people in custody led authorities to the rural area in Edinburg, information provided to Breitbart Texas by the U.S. Border Patrol revealed.

The illegal immigrants arrested in these operations included 17 Guatemalans, 18 Mexicans, 22 Hondurans, 17 Salvadorans, and two Ecuadorans.  All of the individuals arrested in this group were found to be in good health, and were taken to the Weslaco Border Patrol station for processing, the agency stated.

Breitbart Texas previously reported on the uptick of arrests in the Rio Grande Valley Sector, where in two groups, agents had arrested more than 70 women and children.  Illegal women and children have been turning themselves in to authorities, in what could be the start of a humanitarian crisis similar to the one border states experienced last year.

In the previous Breitbart Texas report, Managing Editor Brandon Darby talked with the local spokesman for the National Border Patrol Council, who stated that the numbers were currently below last year’s totals, but the uptick could mark the beginning stages of a new migration wave.

Saldana said the numbers tend to spike in the summer months, and while recent arrests do appear to show an uptick, arrest figures are still running about 45 percent lower than last year. According to Saldana, by this time last year the agency had apprehended about 172,000 illegal immigrants, while so far this year they have processed around 96,000 detentions.

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