Normally, the agency would transfer the migrants to Immigration and Customs Enforcement to be "processed" and in many cases placed in detention facilities. But officials said Wednesday that a recent influx of Central American families has led to a severe shortage of space.
But it's not an emergency.
Immigrant advocates suggested the releases were intended to sow confusion at the border and further President Trump's argument that there is a national emergency there.
"They are doing this deliberately so they can release a ton of people at once and create chaos," said Efren Olivares, an attorney with the Texas Civil Rights Project, which sent lawyers to the McAllen bus station to monitor developments. "The government is trying to do this."
There are not too many people coming in. Send more!
Volunteers in the area are already accustomed to helping large numbers of newly released migrants. Elizabeth Cavazos, a leader of the migrant advocacy group Angry Tias & Abuelas of RGV, said ICE typically releases 300 to 500 migrants a day in McAllen.Typically, but that's normal, not a crisis. That's 180,000 per year.
But additional releases in large numbers by the Border Patrol are likely to strain the system, she said.
"I feel like they're trying to put some stress on the volunteer and advocacy groups, all of us touting ‘There's no crisis down here,'" Cavazos said. "Maybe it's for them to save face because they've been calling this a border crisis and everything's peachy keen down here. That's what it feels like."
Open borders it what it feels like to me.