REYNOSA, Tamaulipas — Mexican authorities rescued 44 would-be illegal immigrants who cartel members were holding against their will at a stash house near the Texas border. The raid on the cartel stash house took place on Wednesday in the Delicias neighborhood in this border city, information provided to Breitbart Texas by the local Mexican authorities revealed.

The raid came after anonymous tipster relayed called an anonymous tip to authorities about heavily armed gunmen in the neighborhood who were holding people at a house. Officers with the Fuerza Tamaulipas task force carried out a raid at the house but the cartel gunmen were able to escape.

At the house authorities found 44 would-be illegal immigrants–35 from El Salvador, 6 from Guatemala, two from Honduras and one from Nicaragua. Out of the group, 18 were men, 10 women and 16 were under the age of 18 however authorities did not specify if they were male or female.

The would-be illegal immigrants told police officers that they had been held against their will at the house and had not been fed for days. Authorities provided medical attention and food before turning them over to Mexico’s Immigration Institute.

The raid of the house took place just one day after Texas Governor Greg Abbott sent a letter to Homeland Security Director Jeh Johnson asking for federal support amid a new surge of illegal immigrants being smuggled by cartel members into Texas, Breitbart Texas reported.

According to Abbott, more than 10,000 immigrant families and unaccompanied children were detained after illegally crossing the border in August. The spike in immigration appears to be a 50 percent increase from last year.

During 2014 hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants were funneled into South Texas’ Rio Grande Valley by the cartel linked smugglers. The move rapidly overwhelmed the housing and enforcement capacity of DHS and resulted in the Gulf Cartel making $38 million in just a matter of months out of human smuggling alone.

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award winning journalist with Breitbart Texas you can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook.