People smuggling gangs are making too much money from migrants to allow the end of Title 42 to trigger chaos at the border and a crackdown by U.S. officials, according to a former top Border Patrol officer.
Instead of a tidal wave of immigrants flooding the border, Chris Clem said cartels will control numbers to ensure they can keep the profits flowing in for weeks to come.
Title 42 is due to expire at midnight on Thursday, relaxing public health restrictions designed to stop COVID-19 entering the country with migrants.
A surge in migrants crossing the border is already being reported in Yuma, Arizona, where Clem retired last year as the sector’s Chief Border Patrol Agent.
‘People that are really orchestrating this do not want to make it any more painful,’ he told DailyMail.com.
Chris Clem was Yuma Sector Chief Border Patrol Agent before retiring last year. He said people smugglers would not want chaos when Title 42 end – they would want to keep profits rolling in
This was the scene in his former sector in the early hours of Wednesday morning. Yuma in Arizona has seen the number of migrants arriving rocket in recent days
‘There’s money to be made every time a person crosses the border.
‘If they make it a big disaster by having disorganized chaos there’s going to be a response. Even this administration is going to say OK we gotta stop this for a couple of days.’
Closing the border to stem chaos would be bad for business.
DailyMail.com reported this week on an effort to control access to the border wall in Ciudad Juárez, where about 400 people had gathered waiting to cross in El Paso, Texas.
A man called Alexander controlled a gap in razor wire that gave access to the dusty strip of land that ran up to the wall. Migrants whose names were not on his list were not allowed through the razor wire.
‘From last week we started putting together a list for when Title 42 ends,’ he said. ‘The idea is to keep things orderly to improve their chances of being allowed in through the wall.’
He claimed to have made the journey from Venezuela himself and that no money was changing hands.
But Clem, who served for 27 years with Border Patrol before retiring last year, said it was exactly the sort of way a people smuggling gang would operate.
Hot spots run the length of the US-Mexico border, from California to Texas
Migrants await processing after crossing the border from Mexico into Yuma. The city’s mayor said he expected 1200 people to be picked up on Wednesday
Migrants gather in a camp next to the border wall in Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico on Tuesday, two days before Title 42 is set to expire
‘It’s like the American mafia,’ he said. ‘Everybody was on the same page and if somebody got out of line and went and roughed somebody up, or stole, or killed somebody, that brought unnecessary attention. This is the same.
‘So you have gatekeepers who control access to this plaza, and says if you’re not on the list you are messing up business.
‘They have adjusted their business model to handle a few thousand a day. If you have too many or cause too much chaos, it’s going to hurt profits.’
Clem’s old patch is a hotspot for illegal crossings. On Wednesday, the city’s mayor said he expected the number of people picked up to hit 1,200 — up from about 300 per day.
Tens of thousands of people are reported to be waiting in Mexico, ready to make their move once Title 42 lifts.
Alexander (center in bucket hat) and his associates control access to the dusty strip of land the runs by the El Paso border wall. If you’re not on his list, you’re not getting in
It effectively meant that detainees could be sent straight home without lodging an asylum request. With the end of Title 42, they will be processed by border authorities and some will be released into the U.S. with a court date to hear their claim.
Clem said Border Patrol and other federal agencies have prepared extensively for the day the regulation would end. There were false alarms when agencies readied their plans only for courts to rule that Title 42 had to stay in place.
‘I think it is very well coordinated, not because of the administration, because of the people that are running the agencies … it is the men and women on the ground,’ he said.
‘They don’t have to deal with it in Washington. They deal with in on the border.
‘Because I have no doubt that, as messy as this is going to be, they’re going to do a great job.’
