DHS secretary acknowledges Border Patrol staffing shortages during visit to Texas border

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas met with Border Patrol agents in El Paso on Thursday and reassured agency officials he’s aware of the toll the COVID-19 pandemic is taking on staffing levels, said El Paso’s County judge. Judge Ricardo Samaniego was one of several local officials Mayorkas met with during his three-day trip to the border, which began in Yuma, Ariz. Wednesday. Mayorkas is scheduled to be in Laredo on Friday for similar meetings. “We know we’re going into a very critical stage of having the right personnel. He actually met with a lot of the agents to motivate them,” Samaniego told KTEP about Mayorkas’ visit. “As you know, if you need five agents and two have COVID, the other three take the brunt and they get overwhelmed.”

Mayorkas also assured Border Patrol agents in El Paso he was working to deliver more technology, vehicles and support for the agency. He told local officials that migrant capacity in the sector will be considered before migrants taken into custody elsewhere are transferred to El Paso, KTEP reported. “I feel comfortable that he's willing to make sure that we get the right transportation” for migrants, Samaniego said. “That we (can) look at personnel and personnel coming from other areas that maybe are not as hard-hit as ours would be.” The visits to Texas come as the Biden administration is under fire from both conservatives and immigrant rights groups over his handling of border and asylum policies. Customs and Border Protection released statistics this week that showed agents encountered more than 2 million unauthorized people at the southern border during the 2021 calendar year, a record high. That figure includes apprehensions of undocumented immigrants, asylum seekers who surrendered to authorities, border crossers deemed “inadmissible” by agents at ports of entries, and people who tried to enter the country multiple times.