Border City Declares State Of Disaster After Release Of 1,500 COVID Positive Migrants Last Week

Officials in the border city of McAllen, Texas, declared a state of disaster after border officials released some 1,500 migrants positive for COVID-19 last week, according to a statement provided to the Daily Caller News Foundation Wednesday.

The Catholic Charities of the Rio Grande Valley partnered with American Medical Response to test thousands of migrants released from Customs and Border Protection (CBP) custody for COVID-19, according to the statement. Migrants who test positive for the virus are taken from the testing facility to designated quarantine sites around Texas’ Rio Grande Valley.

“Since mid-February of 2021 there have been over 7,000 confirmed COVID-19 positive immigrants released into the City of McAllen by CBP, including over 1,500 new cases in the past seven days,” the City of McAllen said in a statement provided to the DCNF.

McAllen Mayor Javier Villalobos issued a disaster declaration for the city on Monday, according to the statement. The declaration will allow the city of McAllen access to state and county resources to help mitigate the increasing arrivals of migrants and the management of non-government-run migrant facilities.

“Despite the City of McAllen and its community partners’ best efforts, the sheer number of immigrants being released into the city has become a crisis: a crisis the City of McAllen did not create and has proactively tried to avoid for seven years,” the City of McAllen said in a statement provided to the DCNF. “Now, with the drastic, unexpected increase of immigrants arriving to McAllen, the City Commission’s first priority is to protect the health and safety of the residents they serve.”

More than 78,000 migrants were encountered in the Rio Grande Valley in July, the Associated Press reported Tuesday. Officials encountered around 210,000 migrants at the southern border in July, up from nearly 190,000 migrants, according to preliminary numbers.