Live Updates: At Least 46 Migrants Found Dead in
San Antonio
Three people were detained in what appeared to be one
of the worst episodes of migrant death in recent years on the southern border.
A heat wave in Texas has brought record temperatures and drought.
More Than 40 Migrants Found Dead in Trailer in San
Antonio
The bodies of more than 40 migrants were found in and
around a tractor-trailer on the outskirts of San Antonio, officials said in a
news conference.
James
Dobbins, J. David Goodman and Edgar Sandoval
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2022/06/27/us/migrants-san-antonio-tractor-killed#abbott-immigration-tx
The death toll appears to be one of the highest in
recent years.
SAN ANTONIO
— The bodies of at least 46 people believed to be migrants who crossed into the
United States from Mexico were found dead on Monday in and around a tractor-trailer
that had been abandoned on the outskirts of San Antonio, state and city
officials said.
At least 16
others, including children, were taken to local hospitals alive but suffering
from heat exhaustion and apparent dehydration, city officials said during a
news conference at the scene of what appeared to be one of the worst episodes
of migrant death in the United States in recent years.
“The plight
of migrants seeking refuge is always a humanitarian crisis,” Mayor Ron
Nirenberg of San Antonio told reporters late Monday. “But tonight we are
dealing with a horrific human tragedy.”
The chief
of the San Antonio Police Department, William McManus, said three people had
been taken into custody. Earlier in the day, officers had been searching for
the driver of the vehicle, who appeared to have abandoned the truck sometime
before it was discovered in a remote area near railroad tracks and auto salvage
yards southwest of downtown. Chief McManus did not say if the driver was among
those detained.
The truck
was discovered by a worker from a nearby business who “heard a cry for help and
came out to investigate,” said Chief McManus, adding that the worker had found
the doors of the trailer partially open and found a number of bodies inside.
Most of the
bodies, which included men and women, were found inside of the truck at around
6 p.m., though at least one was outside of the vehicle. The fire chief, Charles
Hood, said the people who were transported to hospitals were “hot to the touch”
and appeared to be suffering from “heat stroke, heat exhaustion.” The truck,
though designed to be refrigerated, had “no visible, working A/C unit,” he
said.
State
officials in Texas, already managing record levels of migrant crossings from
Mexico, have been bracing for a new surge this spring and summer. All of the
victims were believed to have crossed into the United States illegally and been
brought north. The closest border crossing is roughly 140 miles away.
“These
deaths are on Biden,” Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, said in a short statement
on Twitter. “They are a result of his deadly open border policies. They show
the deadly consequences of his refusal to enforce the law.”
Officials
did not say how the people had died, but suggested that the extreme heat had
been a cause. San Antonio and other cities across Texas have been experiencing
heat in June that is at or near record levels. The temperature on Monday in the
city had topped 100 degrees.
“Imagine
being abandoned inside an 18-wheeler left to die,” Representative Tony
Gonzales, whose congressional district stretches from the outskirts of San
Antonio to the border, wrote on Twitter. “Will @AliMayorkas even mention their
names?” he added, referring to Alejandro Mayorkas, the secretary of homeland
security.
A spokesman
for the Texas state police referred questions to the San Antonio Police
Department, which did not respond to requests for comment. The Department of
Homeland Security, was expected to take over the investigation.
The federal
agency said in a statement that it was working with state and local authorities
to investigate the deaths. Agents from Homeland Security Investigations, a unit
specialized in smuggling, was collecting evidence inside the trailer, officials
said.
San Antonio
is a major transit point for migrants making their way from Texas to places
across the United States. Tens of thousands of migrants have passed through the
city in recent months, according to immigrant advocates.
For more
than a year, Mr. Abbott has poured billions of dollars in state funding into
increasing the presence of the Texas State Police and National Guard soldiers
at the border. But the effort has been unable to stop the flow of migrants
crossing from Mexico either to seek asylum or, in other cases, to evade the
authorities and enter the country illegally.
Earlier on
Monday, Mr. Abbott had been touting his government’s efforts on Twitter,
posting statistics on the number of migrants apprehended. Mr. Abbott’s office
did not immediately comment on the deaths near San Antonio before the governor
returned to Twitter to confirm the deaths and attack President Biden, a
Democrat, whom Mr. Abbott has sought to blame for the large number of arriving
migrants.
Ruby
Chavez, 53, a housewife who lives about a mile away from where the truck was
found, heard about the discovery on television, then saw a helicopter churning
overhead. She came to the scene with her husband, Ruben, to pray.
The area
was a location known to locals as a “drop-off spot” for migrants, the couple
said.
“You can
tell they just get here. We see them with backpacks or asking for food or
money,” Ms. Chavez said. “It’s sad. And now I’m hearing there are kids.”
Her husband
added: “They know this area. They jump off the train and get picked up.”
Dozens of
police officers and fire officials massed around the scene along Quintana Road,
where the truck was found, a road sandwiched between train tracks and auto
salvage yards that has a rural feel despite being inside the city limits.
Several farms are nearby.
In recent
days, law enforcement officials along the border and in nearby counties have
expressed concern at the number of arriving migrants in Texas, which has long
been one of the most heavily trafficked borders for migrants. Federal officials
have recorded a record number of illegal crossings across the southern border
for this point in the year, with more than 44,000 recorded last month just in
the area around Del Rio and Eagle Pass, the border city closest to San Antonio.
Smugglers
often transport large numbers of migrants in trailers, vans or S.U.V.s after
meeting them in remote areas once they have managed to enter the United States.
One of the
deadliest smuggling cases occurred in 2003, when sheriff’s deputies discovered
the bodies of 17 migrants, including a 7-year-old boy, inside an overheated
trailer in Victoria, a city in southern Texas. When officials located the
trailer at a truck stop, they found that the migrants trapped inside had
attempted to punch air holes out so they could breathe. Another migrant later
died at a hospital.
In 2017, 10
men died in San Antonio after riding in a tractor-trailer packed with as many
as 200 migrants who did not have food, water or fresh air for hours. Nearly 30
other people were hospitalized, and the driver was sentenced to life in prison
for his role in the smuggling operation.
Crashes
near the border are also common, sometimes during chases by law enforcement.
In 2012, a
Ford pickup crammed with more than 20 undocumented migrants struck two trees in
South Texas, killing 15 people. In March 2021, 13 people were killed in a
remote stretch of Southern California when a crammed Ford Expedition drove into
the path of a tractor-trailer. And last August, at least 10 people died and 20
others were injured after a van crashed in South Texas.
In May,
agents apprehended more than 239,000 migrants along the border, an all-time
high, including people who had already attempted to enter before. The United
States has been carrying out a public health emergency policy, known as Title
42, that has resulted in about half of the migrants being returned to Mexico or
flown back to their home countries.
However,
ever-larger numbers of migrants from India, Russia, Senegal and elsewhere
cannot be expeditiously removed because their countries will not accept them,
and they are being allowed to enter the United States. At the border, they are
placed in deportation proceedings and receive notices to appear in court or
report to immigration authorities in the interior of the country.
“This
horrible tragedy is a reminder that we need a safe, orderly way for people to
claim asylum,” said Representative Joaquin Castro of San Antonio, a Democrat.
“The continued use of Title 42 has made desperate people even more desperate.”
The policy
has also given migrants an incentive to make repeated attempts to cross the
border if they do not succeed on their first try, immigration analysts say, one
factor in the escalating number of crossings over the past year.
In addition
to the single adults who typically make such crossings, thousands of families
and children have been arriving daily from Central America, driven by violence,
natural disasters and the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.
There has
also been a spike in the number of single adults from Mexico and Central
America seeking entry into the United States, often after treacherous routes to
evade detection by authorities.
It was not
clear where the people who were found on Monday had come from.
Miriam
Jordan and Eliza Fawcett contributed reporting.
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