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On May 2, the White House announced that the U.S. will be sending troops to the southern border to deal with the expected surge of illegal migrants entering the country as Title 42 ends on May 11.
For the past 2 years, border patrol agents have struggled to keep up with and control a flood of illegal border crossers that began pouring into the country after Joe Biden took office.
On Tuesday, Gen. Pat Ryder, the Pentagon Press Secretary, confirmed that 1,500 military personnel would be deployed to the southern border to "supplement" Border Patrol for 90 days. Ryder also indicated that the deployment could be extended if necessary.
According to the Pentagon Press Secretary, the 1,500 troops "will fill critical capability gaps, such as ground-based detection and monitoring, data entry, and warehouse support until CBP [Customs and Border Protection] can address these needs through contracted support."
"Military personnel will not directly participate in law enforcement activities," Ryder concluded.
The first group of personnel to be sent to the border will come from active-duty troops, but the Pentagon is considering other options, including sending personnel from the reserves.
According to White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, the decision to send troops to the border was made in the hopes that doing so would allow Border Patrol agents to focus on apprehending migrants who illegally cross the border.
Biden is not the first president to send troops to deal with the crisis at the southern border. Former President Donald Trump sent military personnel to the border in 2018 and was promptly criticized by Democrats who saw the move as a "politicization" of the military. Jean-Pierre, however, took a different tone with reporters this time saying that the decision to send troops to the border is a "common practice."
Referring to the Department of Defense, Jean-Pierre told reporters, "DoD personnel have been supporting [Customs and Border Protection] at the border for almost two decades now."
Meanwhile, according to a report from Zerohedge, the Department of Homeland Security released a statement on Tuesday saying that the additional personnel would help "to reduce irregular migration, ensure safe, orderly, and efficient processing, and promptly remove individuals without a legal basis to remain in the United States."
There are already some 2,500 military personnel serving in some way along the southern border. The addition of 1,500 additional troops comes as the Pentagon and White House prepare for the end of the Covid-era Title 42 policy that made it easier legally to turn illegal immigrants away at the border.
It should also be noted that while there has been a consistent increase in the flood of illegal migrants that have crossed into the U.S. illegally at the southern border, the Biden administration has refused to use the term "crisis" to describe the situation.
Both President Biden and Department of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas, have continued to insist that the southern border is secure and there has not been a drastic increase in the number of illegal crossings, despite there being large amounts of data and figures to dispute such claims.
Given that the Pentagon has noted that military personnel deployed to the border will not be engaging in "law enforcement activities," it is expected that the 1,500 troops will be at the border merely to control and facilitate the expected surge of illegal immigrants and to assist with processing, rather than be there to stop people from entering the country illegally.
This should come as no surprise from the administration that has refused to even acknowledge the drastic increase of illegals entering the U.S. at the southern border.
