Flights Of Migrant Families From Texas Arriving In San Diego

SAN DIEGO, CA – The U.S. Border Patrol has begun to fly hundreds of migrant families from Texas to San Diego for processing, it was reported Monday.

The plan to handle the ongoing influx of Central American families will send three planes a week to San Diego to help agents in the Rio Grande Valley sector process everyone in its custody, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.

That sector, which is over capacity, had more than 6,000 people in custody Friday morning, compared with about 800 in custody in the San Diego area, the newspaper reported.

Border Patrol officials plan to send three flights per week of 120 to 135 people each to San Diego, according to interim Chief Patrol Agent Douglas Harrison. The first flight in the program landed Friday.

The flights and subsequent buses to Border Patrol stations will be operated by Immigration and Customs Enforcement or its contractors.

No unaccompanied children will be included in the flights, but agents were preparing for the possibility of fraudulent family claims when the migrants arrive in San Diego, according to the Union-Tribune. Children can be separated from adults whom immigration officials determine are not actually their parents, and those children become unaccompanied minors in the system.

The San Diego plan is in addition to migrants who are already being transported from the Rio Grande Valley to the Del Rio Sector in another part of the Texas border.

Migrants are also being bused from the Yuma Sector to the El Centro Sector and from the Rio Grande Valley Sector to the Laredo Sector.

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--City News Service