The surge of illegal aliens in the U.S. has reached alarming levels despite the administration's and the media's refusal to acknowledge the situation, according to an officer from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Texas.
The officer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the ICE can no longer accommodate the influx of aliens. Some agents assigned to deal with interior enforcement programs, or those who seek and remove criminal aliens who are already inside the country, have to be pulled out so they can help process the aliens crossing the border, Breitbart News reported.
In some cases, when the ICE cannot find placement for the aliens, it is forced to release them from custody. They fade "into the wind never to be seen by us again," the officer told Breitbart in an exclusive interview. This puts public safety at risk, he said.
The officer warned that migrants with criminal records or "terrorists whose intent is to harm Americans or our country as a whole" could be among those who enter the border. He said the threat of terrorists is a serious concern for the agency, particularly with many interior enforcement agents pulled out and moved to the border.
"Would-be perpetrators have much more of a chance to make it through the system and into our communities. That's a huge concern for us," the officer said. "I don't understand why the administration and the media are not recognizing this as a crisis because that's what it is."
Last month, Customs and Border Protection reported that for the Fiscal Year 2016, there have been a total of 408,870 apprehensions on the southwest border. This was a lot higher than the previous fiscal year's 331,333.
"We are determined to treat migrants in a humane manner. At the same time, we must enforce our immigration laws consistent with our enforcement priorities," Sec. Jeh Johnson of the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement. "This has included, and will continue to include, providing individuals with an opportunity to assert claims for asylum and other forms of humanitarian relief."
The present border crisis is a lot worse than that in 2014, and one factor that's driving the flooding of aliens is Pres. Barack Obama's migration process.
The coming election is also another factor causing illegal aliens to scramble to the border, especially with the question of whether immigration laws would be tightened or relaxed, depending on who wins the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Local border patrol agent Chris Cabrera said they are seeing "massive spikes of people crossing and turning themselves in," sometimes reaching up to a thousand on some days.
"The smugglers are telling them if Hillary gets elected, that there'll be some sort of amnesty, that they need to get here by a certain date," Cabrera told CBS News. "They're also being told that if Trump gets elected, there's going to be some magical wall that pops up overnight and once that wall gets up, nobody will ever get in again."
