Local smuggling incidents part of larger increase in immigration during Biden administration
After a desperate 911 call from a self-reported migrant trapped in a tanker truck with up to 80 others in San Antonio, a frantic search for a truck smuggling immigrants ensued in San Antonio and the surrounding areas in early February and made headlines throughout the city.
Bexar County deputies and federal investigators never found that tanker the man — who was gasping for air and telling dispatchers he had no oxygen — was stuck in, nor the other immigrants trapped inside.
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Last week, the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office received a similar 911 call, this time about a different tractor-trailer carrying migrants.
More than 150 immigrants were found running from that truck as the winter storm began, when authorities eventually found it.
Court records reviewed by Guillermo Contreras of the Express-News show the two local cases are just a small piece in the growing problem of immigrant smuggling that has exacerbated in the month following President Joe Biden’s inauguration.
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Contreras reports that south Texas smuggling cases have been on a drastic rise in recent months. Since October, Border Patrol’s Laredo sector has seen a 160 percent increased in smuggling attempts when compared to last year’s numbers.
San Antonio acts as a huge gateway for smugglers carrying hundreds of migrants in close quarters, originally from countries including Brazil, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras, from border cities to larger Texas cities like Dallas and Houston. Undocumented immigrant arrests are also up in Laredo by 140 percent.
Earlier in February, Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador said hopeful immigrants wrongfully think “doors are open” to the United States because of Biden.
“Our brother migrants should have this information so that they won’t be deceived by human traffickers, who paint a rosy picture,” López Obrador told the Associated Press.
It’s likely south Texas as a whole, and San Antonio specifically, can expect more arrests, detainment, calls for help and stretched resources as smuggling increases continue.
Karly Williams is a digital producer for MySA. She holds a bachelors in journalism from the University of Cincinnati. Follow her @karlyjwilliams
