Simon Romero

“I’d load up my guns for the fighting if we could just secede and join Texas,” said Moorhead from Loco Hills, population about 125. “They love the money from our oil up in Santa Fe. But they treat us like dirt.”

Moorhead, 42, may sound more extreme than most. But go just about anywhere in southeastern New Mexico, the deeply conservative oil-rich region known as “Little Texas,” and people are seething over a political shift to the left in the state capital.

A frenetic oil boom is laying bare this divide, while suddenly lifting one of the poorest states in the country into the top ranks of global oil producers. Normally that might be cause for celebration, but Democrats now in power in New Mexico are coming under fire on two fronts: from oil patch conservatives, for pushing to hike oil royalties and spend the windfall on progressive causes; and from environmentalists on the left, for allowing the oil boom to materialize in the first place.

After Democrats swept elections in New Mexico in 2018, they quickly enacted a “mini Green New Deal” requiring that by 2045, all electricity in the state must come from renewable energy. Going further, Democrats sought to assert greater control over the oil industry with proposed legislation to hike oil royalties and ban hydraulic fracturing.

Those bills unleashed fury in southeastern New Mexico before stalling in the state Legislature, and revealed an intensifying source of tension: Republican-controlled areas of the state produce the state’s oil wealth, while Democrats decide how to spend it.

New Mexico recently surpassed Alaska, Oklahoma and California in oil production, and is now the third-largest oil-producing state. Skyrocketing production is bolstering the state’s traditionally fragile finances, generating a projected budget surplus of $1.3 billion for 2019.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, is moving fast to use the bonanza. New Mexico increased spending this year on early childhood programs, raised teacher salaries and, in one of the boldest state-led efforts to expand access to higher education, unveiled a plan to use surging oil income to make tuition free at public universities.

Conservatives in southeastern New Mexico have reacted with a mixture of resentment and alarm over such plans. Some question why the rest of the state should benefit from their work when their own roads and schools need funds. Mark Veteto, an oilman who is among New Mexico’s largest political donors, argued that a fracking ban could have a draconian impact.

“I’m hearing from friends in Texas, ‘What the hell is going on in New Mexico?’” said Veteto, a Republican. “We’re a pillar of the economy, we’re thriving, so it’s hard to understand why they’re going after us.”

At the same time, Lujan Grisham is facing an outcry from progressives about boosting production of fossil fuels that contribute to global warming.

“New Mexico simply needs to keep all of its oil in the ground,” said Mariel Nanasi, executive director of New Energy Economy, a Santa Fe group promoting clean energy sources. Taking aim at the plan to use oil revenues to cover university tuition, she asked, “Why does a college degree frankly matter if someone is graduating into a world of climate disaster?”

With moderate Democrats now largely in control, the multifaceted debate reflects the rearrangement of political power in what has traditionally been a swing state. The 2004 election marked the last time a Republican presidential candidate carried the state. In 2018, Democrats won every statewide office and flipped the congressional seat representing southeastern New Mexico.

Stephanie Garcia Richard, a Democrat elected last year as state land commissioner, acknowledged that people in southeastern New Mexico were chafing at her efforts to tighten control over the oil industry.

“People saw a forked tail and horns coming out of my head and they thought, ‘Garcia Richard gets elected and the entire industry dies,’” said the commissioner, a teacher who is the first woman and the first Latina in the post.

“We’re holding people’s feet to the fire, absolutely we are,” she said, emphasizing that her proposal to raise oil royalties to 25%, hotly contested by oil producers, would only match the rate in Texas. “But this state matters to me.”

New Mexico’s oil industry is thriving, she said, with production forecast to reach the milestone of 1 million barrels per day later this year.

That projected surge has some environmental leaders in the state fuming. The mini Green New Deal, they say, shifts electricity production away from fossil fuels — mainly coal — but does nothing to scale back the oil production that also contributes to climate change.

Others on the left eye the boom from another angle, saying the oil windfall is a sliver of what it should be in relation to New Mexico’s new significance in global oil markets.

After doubling output in the past two years to 900,000 barrels a day, New Mexico now produces more oil than OPEC members Ecuador, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon combined. If the state is to develop clean energy sources while also fighting poverty, political leaders need to generate even more revenues from oil, said Jon Goldstein, a former state energy secretary.

“So much of the profit from this boom is flowing to Houston or London when it should remain in New Mexico,” said Goldstein, now with the Environmental Defense Fund.

Hobbs, a city in the heart of oil country that straddles the state line with Texas, has daily flights to Houston but none to any cities in New Mexico. Here, it is apparent that at least some of the oil bounty stayed in the state.

A futuristic $63.5 million recreational complex features a three-story jungle gym, an indoor lacrosse field and a water park with slides, geysers, rain clouds and a lazy river.

Well-kept walking trails and bike paths traverse the city of 38,000. Miguel Corral, 33, a Mexican immigrant with an oil field trucking business, opened a new rodeo arena this year featuring everything from roping competitions to boxing matches and country western bands.

Vehicles with Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma license plates ply the roads, reflecting an influx of out-of-state job seekers. With recent high school graduates earning more than $100,000 a year in the oil fields, some in Hobbs bemoan the rising cost of living.

Jazmine Brantley, 33, an economics professor from Atlanta who lived in Hobbs briefly in 2016, said she was stunned when she moved back in August. Rent for a one-bedroom apartment in her complex had surged from $735 a month to $1,100.

“It used to be just beat-up trucks in the parking lot,” Brantley said. “Now it’s brand-new Jeeps, BMWs, Cadillac Escalades.”

Dean Johnson, 60, who makes cowboy boots by hand out of caribou, shark and ostrich, said he was able to sell each pair for $1,450 and up — and some customers have to wait two years.

“We’re humming along, doing good for ourselves and making a load of money for New Mexico,” Johnson said. “But we know the rest of the state would get rid of us if they could.”

Some tension involves historical cultural differences. Elsewhere in New Mexico, people often disdain any association with Texas, sentiment stretching back at least to a disastrous attempt by the pro-slavery Republic of Texas to invade New Mexico in the 1840s.

In much of New Mexico, Hispanic history and culture, along with the Spanish language enduring in the state for centuries, are celebrated. Lujan Grisham, a Hispanic Democrat, won the governor’s race in a landslide last year against Steve Pearce, an Anglo Republican from Hobbs.

In southeastern New Mexico, politics remain largely dominated by Anglos — even though Latinos account for nearly 60% of the population of Lea County, which includes Hobbs. When the only Latino on the county commission this year proposed a $1,500 bonus to county employees who pass a Spanish proficiency test, the commission, made up entirely of Republicans, rejected the proposal.

Residents in the southeastern part of the state openly express admiration for Texas’ culture and economic mettle. Many speak with an accent closer to that of Abilene than Albuquerque.

“We’re pretty far from Santa Fe out here,” said Bob Reid, chief executive of the JF Maddox Foundation, a philanthropic group started by a longtime utility magnate in Hobbs that is among New Mexico’s largest private foundations. “Even our liberals tend to be a little more conservative.”

West of Hobbs, on a road cutting through fracking sites and gas flares lighting up the night sky, lies the epicenter of the oil boom: the town of Carlsbad.

Traffic congestion, housing capacity, law enforcement shortages — all are posing problems in a town whose 29,000 residents are increasingly agitated by oil royalties flowing to other parts of New Mexico.

Allen Davis, the county manager of Eddy County, said officials had discussed printing T-shirts for distribution in the state proclaiming, “You’re Fracking Welcome.”

“Man camps” are popping up all over town, providing temporary housing for the overwhelmingly male workforce in the oil fields. At one such camp, occupancy in October was at 100%, with nearly 400 people staying in prefabricated buildings, according to the manager, Rocío Delgado.

Delgado said she had tried, and sometimes failed, to keep the rowdiness down.

“Guys were dressing up prostitutes in work uniforms, trying to sneak them in when they were pulling in with their trucks,” she said. “I cut that out right quick.”

Businesses of all types have such a hard time finding workers that recruiters pitch gigs in the Walmart parking lot. Walmart lost so many employees to better-paying jobs that it poached cleaning ladies from the man camp, Delgado said. The women, who came in from El Paso, now work as cashiers, and Walmart covers their rent at the camp.

Davis, a former executive for the oil giant Chevron who moved from Australia, said breakneck growth in Carlsbad and Hobbs could soon produce a metropolitan region similar in size to Midland-Odessa in West Texas, which have a combined population of more than a quarter of a million people.

“What they did in 50 years, we’ve got to do in five,” he said.

At the No Whiner Diner, a sign in the parking lot seemed to be chiding the state for Carlsbad’s colossal traffic jams: “Congestion not just in your head,” it said.

The other side proclaimed, “Santa Fe taketh more than giveth.”

This article originally appeared in

New Mexico's 'Little Texas' Booms, Igniting Battles Over Oil Windfall

LOCO HILLS, N.M. — At the diner she manages in the heart of New Mexico’s oil country, Joni Moorhead talks to roughnecks all day long about potholed roads, cramped lodging camps, soaring rents — and state politics.

Oregon police arrested him in 2006 on charges of impersonating a police officer and a felony weapons offense. They had found him showing guns to teenagers in a gas-station parking lot while wearing a police-style uniform and a badge emblazoned with the words “Special Agent.”

“Hopkins stated that he worked for the federal government directly under George Bush,” Officer Jack Daniel of the sheriff’s office in Klamath County, Oregon, wrote in his report. Hopkins, the report said, claimed variously to be investigating a meth lab, hunting fugitives and undertaking unspecified “operations” in Afghanistan.

Officials in South Dakota indicted Hopkins in 2009 on charges of failure to pay child support. Long before then, Hopkins pleaded guilty in 1996 in Michigan to felony possession of a loaded firearm and was sentenced to 16 months to two years in prison.

Hopkins finally came under the scrutiny of federal authorities in 2017, after the FBI received reports that his group was “training” to assassinate Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and George Soros, according to documents unsealed Monday in federal court.

Hopkins, 69, appeared in U.S. District Court on Monday after his arrest over the weekend on yet another charge, this time of being a felon in possession of firearms and ammunition.

The arrest followed the posting online of a series of videos by Hopkins’ group, which calls itself the United Constitutional Patriots, showing men in camouflage circling and detaining hundreds of migrants in the desert near Sunland Park, New Mexico, and then handing the migrants over to Border Patrol.

The heavily armed militia’s actions have ignited debate over whether its members broke kidnapping laws and effectively acted as a paramilitary force supporting the Border Patrol. Militia members argue that they were assisting authorities to patrol remote areas of the border and carrying out “verbal citizen’s arrests.”

In an affidavit, David S. Gabriel, an FBI special agent, said the bureau was made aware of the activities of Hopkins after receiving reports in October 2017 of “alleged militia extremist activity” in northwestern New Mexico.

Gabriel said that the following month, two FBI agents went to a trailer park in Flora Vista, New Mexico, where Hopkins was living at the time. With Hopkins’ consent, the agents entered the home and saw about 10 firearms in plain view, in what Hopkins referred to as his office.

Hopkins, who has also used the name Johnny Horton Jr., told the agents that the guns belonged to Fay Sanders Murphy, whom he described to agents as his common-law wife, according to the affidavit. The agents collected at least nine firearms from the home as evidence, including a 12-gauge shotgun and various handguns.

The court affidavit gave few details about the report the FBI received stating that the United Constitutional Patriots “were training to assassinate George Soros, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama because of these individuals’ support of Antifa.” The term Antifa refers to left-wing activists who have clashed with right-wing groups in cities across the country.

The FBI also did not specify why agents waited to arrest Hopkins after finding his home awash in guns in 2017. At that time, agents concluded that his possession of the weapons was illegal because he had a previous felony conviction. Separately, a probation officer in Oregon had already asked in 2007 for a warrant for Hopkins’ arrest after he failed to report to probation meetings.

Hopkins’ lawyer, Kelly O’Connell, disputed the reports about assassination plans. “My client told me that is not true,” O’Connell said.

He also questioned the timing of the arrest. “My question is, why now?” O’Connell said. He suggested that pressure from prominent Democrats in New Mexico may have prompted the FBI to take action.

O’Connell said Hopkins planned to plead not guilty to the latest charge.

After the 2017 search of Hopkins’ residence in New Mexico, FBI agents contacted the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and determined that none of the firearms collected from the home was manufactured in New Mexico, opening the door to possible additional charges of transporting the weapons in interstate commerce, a federal offense.

O’Connell, who was the host of a conservative radio talk show program in New Mexico until 2017, declined to say who was paying Hopkins’ legal fees.

Hopkins could face up to 10 years in prison if he is found guilty of the new charge. He told the judge Monday that he suffers from various medical problems and gave his age as 70, though court records showed he was 69.

“I’m not a militia specialist,” O’Connell said when asked about the motives of Hopkins and other members of the armed group. He added, “They believe they are helping to enforce the laws of America on immigration.”

Jim Benvie, a spokesman for the United Constitutional Patriots, declined to talk Monday about Hopkins’ legal problems or other actions by the group. But he insisted that the group planned to remain camped near the border in Sunland Park.

“We’re not leaving,” Benvie said.

Still, pressure is building on the group from various directions. Both PayPal and GoFundMe banned accounts for the group, potentially making it harder for the militia to receive donations. And the rail transportation company Union Pacific said it believed that the group was camped on land adjacent to its property in southern New Mexico.

“They have trespassed on our property to access this camp,” said a Union Pacific spokesman, Tim McMahan. “While we cannot make them move their camp, we have asked them to not trespass on our property.”

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/22/us/militia-border-new-mexico.html" id="2450d6ce-ad08-31e4-aedb-f690a9387ea3">The New York Times</a>.

LAS CRUCES, N.M. — Before the FBI arrested Larry Hopkins, the leader of the right-wing militia that detained migrant families in the New Mexico desert, he’d had so many run-ins with the law that his police record stretched across much of the United States.

FBI Was Told That Militia in New Mexico Planned to Kill Obama and Clinton

Larry Mitchell Hopkins, 69, appeared in U.S. District Court on Monday after his arrest over the weekend on a charge of being a felon in possession of firearms and ammunition.

The arrest followed a series of videos posted by Hopkins’ group, which calls itself the United Constitutional Patriots, showing men in camouflage circling and detaining hundreds of migrants in the desert near Sunland Park, New Mexico, and then handing the migrants over to Border Patrol.

In an affidavit, David S. Gabriel, an FBI special agent, said the bureau was made aware of Hopkins’ activities after receiving reports in October 2017 of “alleged militia extremist activity” in northwestern New Mexico.

Gabriel said that the following month, two FBI agents went to a trailer park in Flora Vista, New Mexico, where Hopkins was living at the time. With Hopkins’ consent, the agents entered the home and saw about 10 firearms in plain view.

Hopkins told the agents the guns belonged to Fay Sanders Murphy, whom he described as his common-law wife, according to the affidavit. The agents collected at least nine firearms from the home as evidence.

The court affidavit gave few details about the report the FBI received stating the United Constitutional Patriots “were training to assassinate George Soros, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama because of these individuals’ support of Antifa.” The term Antifa refers to left-wing activists who have clashed with right-wing groups in cities across the country.

Hopkins’ lawyer, Kelly O’Connell, disputed the reports about assassination plans.

He also questioned the timing of the arrest. “My question is, why now?” O’Connell said, noting the weapons were found in Hopkins’ home in 2017. He suggested that pressure from prominent Democrats in New Mexico may have prompted the FBI to take action.

LAS CRUCES, N.M. — The imprisoned leader of a right-wing militia that detained migrant families in New Mexico first came under the scrutiny of federal authorities in 2017, after the FBI received reports that his group was “training” to assassinate Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and George Soros, according to documents unsealed Monday in federal court.

The militia leader, Larry Mitchell Hopkins, 69, appeared in U.S. District Court on Monday after his arrest over the weekend on a charge of being a felon in possession of firearms and ammunition.

He also questioned the timing of the arrest. “My question is, why now?” O’Connell said, noting that the weapons were found in his home in 2017. He suggested that pressure from prominent Democrats in New Mexico may have prompted the FBI to take action.

Hopkins has faced weapons-related charges before, according to court documents. He was convicted of two felonies in Oregon in 2006: criminal impersonation of a peace officer and felony possession of a firearm. And he pleaded guilty in 1996 in Michigan to possession of a loaded firearm, and was sentenced to 16 months to two years in prison.

The group, which calls itself the United Constitutional Patriots, filmed several of its actions in recent days, including the detention this week of about 200 migrants who had recently crossed the border near Sunland Park, New Mexico, with the intention of seeking asylum. They uploaded videos to social media of migrant families, blinking in the darkness in the glare of what appeared to be the militia’s spotlights.

The American Civil Liberties Union denounced the militia’s actions in a letter Thursday that asked New Mexico’s governor and attorney general to investigate the group.

In a statement, Hector Balderas, New Mexico’s attorney general, said: “These individuals should not attempt to exercise authority reserved for law enforcement.”

Jim Benvie, a spokesman for the United Constitutional Patriots, declined to specify how many of its members were in Sunland Park, a city in New Mexico about 9 miles west of El Paso, Texas. He said the group included people with military or law enforcement experience.

Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico said in a statement it was “completely unacceptable” that migrant families “might be menaced or threatened in any way, shape or form when they arrive at our border.”

The video of this week's episode in the New Mexico desert shows Border Patrol agents arriving on the scene at some point after members of the militia had come into contact with the migrants. Before the arrival of the federal agents, a woman narrating the video tells a man who appears to be a militia member “Don't aim the gun” in the direction of the families.

Carlos A. Diaz, a spokesman for Customs and Border Protection declined to discuss the episode or the United Constitutional Patriots, but said the agency “does not endorse private groups or organizations taking enforcement matters into their own hands.”

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/18/us/new-mexico-militia.html" id="0c943614-7d0c-3c54-a26d-b672559e8515">The New York Times</a>.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A right-wing militia group operating in southern New Mexico has begun stopping groups of migrant families and detaining them at gunpoint before handing them over to Border Patrol agents, raising tension over the tactics of armed vigilantes along the border between the United States and Mexico.

Militia in New Mexico Detains Asylum-Seekers at Gunpoint

Members of the group, which calls itself the United Constitutional Patriots, filmed several of their actions in recent days, including the detention this week of a group of about 200 migrants who had recently crossed the border near Sunland Park, New Mexico, with the intention of seeking asylum. They uploaded videos to social media of exhausted-looking migrant families, blinking in the darkness in the glare of what appeared to be the militia’s spotlights.

Professed militias have long operated along the border with attempts to curb the flow of migrants into the United States. But targeting the recent influx of families, who are legally allowed to request asylum and often quickly surrender to Border Patrol agents, is raising tension with human rights activists in this part of the West.

The American Civil Liberties Union denounced the militia’s actions in a letter Thursday that asked New Mexico’s governor and attorney general to investigate the group. The ACLU said the militia had no legal authority under New Mexico or federal law to detain or arrest migrants in the United States.

“We cannot allow racist and armed vigilantes to kidnap and detain people seeking asylum,” two lawyers for the ACLU, María Martínez Sánchez and Kirsten Greer Love, said in the letter.

Jim Benvie, a spokesman for the United Constitutional Patriots, said in a telephone interview that his group had been camped near El Paso, Texas, for the past two months. Benvie contended that his group’s actions were legal, comparing the detention of the migrants to “a verbal citizen’s arrest.”

“We’re just here to support the Border Patrol and show the public the reality of the border,” said Benvie, 43, who recently came to New Mexico from Minnesota. He said the organization plans to remain on the border until the extended wall proposed by President Donald Trump is built or Congress changes immigration laws to make it harder for migrants to request asylum.

Militias have recently stepped up their activities in New Mexico and other states as authorities scramble to respond to a surge in families from Central America, with total apprehensions on the border reaching more than 92,000 in March. Elsewhere on the border, the mayor of Yuma, Arizona, declared an emergency this week as the city sought federal and state assistance to deal with migrant arrivals.

Benvie declined to specify how many of its members were in Sunland Park, a city in New Mexico about 9 miles west of El Paso. He said the group included people with military or law enforcement experience.

“If these people follow our verbal commands, we hold them until Border Patrol comes,” Benvie said. “Border Patrol has never asked us to stand down.”

The governor of New Mexico, Michelle Lujan Grisham, said in a statement that it was “completely unacceptable” that migrant families “might be menaced or threatened in any way, shape or form when they arrive at our border.”

“It should go without saying that regular citizens have no authority to arrest or detain anyone,” she added.

The video of this week's episode in the New Mexico desert shows Border Patrol agents arriving on the scene at some point after members of the militia have already come into contact with the migrants. Before the arrival of the federal agents, a woman narrating the video tells a man who appears to be a militia member “Don't aim the gun” in the direction of the families. The migrants can be seen kneeling on the ground and embracing one another.

Benvie said members of the militia gave a “verbal order of arrest” to the migrants, telling them to wait where they were until Border Patrol agents arrived. Members of his group offered $20 to any of the migrants who could identify the smuggler who helped them cross the border, he said, but none took them up on the offer.

Benvie said members of his group were told not to point their weapons at any of the migrants. He added that the group has a new rule in which members are not allowed to go on patrol with military-style rifles, but can still carry handguns. “We can't make them stay if they don't want to,” he said.

Carlos A. Diaz, a spokesman for Customs and Border Protection, the federal agency that includes the Border Patrol, declined to discuss the episode or the United Constitutional Patriots, but said the agency “does not endorse private groups or organizations taking enforcement matters into their own hands.”

The responses to the militia’s videos on Facebook included an array of antagonistic and racist descriptions of the asylum-seekers.

“Got to stop being sympathetic because of the kids,” said one commentator, Linda Ellen Sweeney. “Got to consider them as collateral damage now. We are DONE.”

Ursela Ojeda, a policy adviser in Washington for the Women’s Refugee Commission, an organization seeking to protect the rights of women and children displaced by conflict and crisis, called the actions of the militia “highly problematic.”

“These are families, and lots of young children, fleeing dangerous situations,” Ojeda said. “I have a hard time seeing how someone has a right to point a loaded weapon at these families.”

The site was empty Sunday morning, and images of the location circulated by journalists showed it empty of migrant families. It was not immediately clear where the families who were held at the site were transferred, or whether the enclosure under the bridge would be used again.

A spokesman for the Border Patrol said he could not comment on the matter right away.

Officials with Customs and Border Protection contended last week that they had no choice but to hold the migrants in the enclosure, surrounded by fencing and razor wire, because of overcrowding at processing facilities in El Paso brought on by a surge in Central American migrants applying for asylum.

Kevin McAleenan, commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, addressed journalists Wednesday near the enclosure when he claimed that the country’s immigration enforcement system was at a “breaking point.”

Criticism over the bridge enclosure had been building all week, with reports of children sleeping on trash-strewn gravel at the site under the Paso del Norte bridge. Some migrant families stayed inside a military tent set up at the site; others remained outside even as nighttime temperatures dipped into the 40s.

The American Civil Liberties Union said Sunday that the detention of migrants in outdoor pens was “an unprecedented and extreme violation.”

Citing interviews with families held under the bridge, the ACLU said it had received reports that agents had verbally and physically harmed migrants, forced them to stand for prolonged periods, deprived them of sleep and access to medical care, and had failed to provide the migrants with adequate food and water.

Some families were detained under the bridge for as long as four days, the ACLU said, adding that families with infant children were told to sleep on the ground and were not provided with any bedding, mats or chairs.

“We are demanding an immediate investigation by the inspector general into abuses inflicted on asylum-seekers by Border Patrol agents in the outdoor facilities,” said Shaw Drake, policy counsel for the ACLU’s border rights center.

Migrants have since been transferred to undisclosed locations, he said, adding that “the agency has not told us or members of Congress where migrants are now being held and under what conditions.”

Local political leaders and human rights groups said that a sharp increase in asylum-seekers should have been foreseeable, as part of an annual surge in border crossings before the arrival of the deadly summer heat.

Immigration officials were already scrambling to respond to a shifting profile of migrants arriving at the border with Mexico. Border Patrol apprehensions remain well below their peak of 1.6 million in 2000, but they have been climbing lately, reaching 467,000 in 2018, the highest figure in six years. And more of them are now Central American families seeking asylum rather than single men from Mexico.

Federal immigration officials claim that legal rulings have created loopholes that make it more attractive for Central Americans to apply for asylum in the United States.

“This status quo is not an option,” Andrew Meehan, assistant commissioner for public affairs at Customs and Border Protection, said in a statement Saturday. “The legal framework must be addressed,” he said, repeating the administration’s calls for Congress to address asylum laws. “The only remedy to this crisis is congressional action.”

Advocates for immigrants said the federal government was obligated by law to humanely process asylum requests and could have avoided the need for migrant families to spend days on end in the holding pen.

“If they wanted to prepare for this, they could have done so,” said Fernando Garcia, director of the Border Network for Human Rights, an organization in El Paso. “The administration could have redirected resources, assigned more asylum agents, looked at what was happening on the ground.”

Immigration officials in El Paso have asserted that detention facilities were overwhelmed in the city, as in other places along the border. McAleenan said that the Border Patrol was temporarily reassigning about 750 inspectors to care for newly arrived Central American families.

In its complaint to the inspector general, the ACLU questioned why the Border Parol was resorting to holding migrants under the bridge when its budget had grown to $16.7 billion in 2019 from $7.1 billion in 2006. The Border Patrol’s workforce has also expanded, the civil liberties union said, reaching 19,555 in 2018, compared with 9,212 in 2000.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/31/us/el-paso-bridge-migrants.html" id="505cee12-bfb1-3ccb-a146-b08d0be3d9df">The New York Times</a>.

Migrant Camp Under El Paso Bridge Has Been Cleared Out

Federal immigration officials appear to have cleared out an enclosure under a bridge in El Paso, Texas, where they were detaining hundreds of families of asylum-seekers, following an outcry over conditions at the site.

El Paso, the Texas border city where the president held a rally in February calling for his wall with Mexico, is emerging as a flash point. Border Patrol agents in the city have begun holding migrant families in an area under a bridge, surrounded by fencing and razor wire.

Photos of the conditions drew attention this week on social media and in news reports. Here’s a look at where the migrants came from, and how they came to be detained under the bridge.

A growing wave of migrants has overwhelmed Texas border facilities

Agents are apprehending about 570 migrants a day in the El Paso metropolitan area, up from about 100 a day five months ago. On some days last year, there were no apprehensions at all in the entire El Paso sector, which stretches across New Mexico and a swath of West Texas.

The increase translates into a lack of space at processing facilities, so officials put up a large military tent under the Paso Del Norte International Bridge in what they describe as a temporary measure. The tent has bathrooms, blankets, water and food — but people appear to be miserable nonetheless.

Stays in the encampment are said to vary from several hours to a couple of days, depending on the flow of migrants across the border. Some migrants are sleeping in cots inside the government tent, while others prefer to sleep on the ground outside.

Kevin McAleenan, the commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, said at a news conference Wednesday near the encampment that the country’s immigration enforcement system is at a “breaking point.”

Leaders in El Paso are skeptical

Political and business leaders in El Paso are expressing criticism over the Trump administration’s handling of the new influx. Many in the city, a Democratic bastion, had already disputed the president’s assertion that border fencing had cut crime in El Paso.

In a news conference in El Paso on Wednesday, McAleenan announced that CBP was temporarily reassigning up to 750 officers to places on the border that are grappling with the increased flow of migrants. But some of those in El Paso say the overall response has been haphazard.

A sticking point is the Trump administration’s plan to spend $192 million on a new immigrant processing center in the city. Officials chose an old 400,000-square-foot Hoover vacuum plant for the site.

But business leaders are questioning whether the manufacturing facility is the best place to process migrants in a humane way. Others claim that federal officials chose the site despite concerns over its proximity to schools, businesses and residential areas.

In any case, the new center won’t be open until at least June.

Tension is building with Mexico

Trump has lashed out at Mexico’s government, claiming on Twitter that it was doing “nothing” to stop unauthorized migrants from reaching the United States.

But the view in Mexico is more nuanced. In fact, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has already given in to some of Trump’s demands, breaking with decades of asylum practices in Mexico.

Mexican authorities have been blocking groups of migrants at some border towns, intercepting unaccompanied minors before they reach U.S. soil and allowing the Trump administration to send more than 120 migrants to Tijuana to await decisions on asylum requests.

Now López Obrador’s efforts to avoid a confrontation with Trump over the issue seem to be waning. The Mexican president said Thursday that while he respected Trump’s position, the problem largely involved the United States and Central American countries.

“I just emphasize that migration flows of Mexicans to the United States are very low,” López Obrador told reporters in Mexico City.

“The Mexican is no longer seeking work in the United States,” he said. “The majority are inhabitants of our fellow Central American countries.”

Migration dynamics from Latin America have changed

Border Patrol apprehensions remain well below their peak of 1.6 million in 2000. But apprehensions climbed to 467,000 in 2018, the highest level in six years. McAleenan said at his news conference Wednesday that there were more than 12,000 migrants in U.S. custody at the beginning of the week.

“As of this morning, that number was 13,400. A high number for us is 4,000. A crisis level is 6,000. 13,000 is unprecedented,” he said.

The important thing to understand is that migration patterns from Latin America have undergone a big shift.

Standing in contrast to previous migration surges, the latest one involves few single men from Mexico. Instead, as more Mexicans actually leave the United States than arrive as migrants, Central American families now account for the large majority of new arrivals.

Whereas the Border Patrol could easily deport unauthorized Mexicans, deporting Central Americans is more challenging. Most are arriving as family units applying for asylum, a process that can take months or years to evaluate. The federal government is letting many migrants go free each week because it lacks enough beds to hold them in family detention centers.

“The situation has changed dramatically, and we’re responding to it the best we can,” said Ramiro Cordero, a Border Patrol spokesman in El Paso.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/29/us/el-paso-immigration-photo.html" id="d5778ad8-190b-32c6-ac4f-89bab2ac6b19">The New York Times</a>.

Migrants are Detained Under a Bridge in El Paso. What Happened?

The surge in Central Americans seeking asylum in the United States is straining facilities across the southwest border, with Border Patrol processing facilities this week handling thousands of people in excess of the system’s capacity. President Donald Trump threatened to close the border next week if Mexico did not halt “all illegal immigration” into the United States.

A spokesman for the Border Patrol said the temporary measure was intended to help provide “appropriate care” for migrants apprehended at the border. The closing of checkpoints — not at the border, but up to 100 miles inland — reflects the strain on border operations as the number of migrants entering the country continues to climb.

Authorities closed checkpoints across the Border Patrol’s El Paso, Texas, sector, which includes 121,000 square miles in New Mexico and 4,500 square miles in Texas, to free more agents to work directly on the border.

At some of the checkpoints on major highways, orange cones could be seen blocking access to the roads, along which motorists normally are funneled to checkpoints for queries about citizenship status and visual inspection of vehicles.

Agents at the Border Patrol checkpoints arrest relatively few migrants in the country illegally, and most of those who are seeking asylum surrender to authorities at the border. The agents at the checkpoints deal largely with seizures of marijuana and other drugs from motorists.

The checkpoints have emerged as a source of contention with human rights groups, which have contended Border Patrol agents routinely ignore their legal authority during the traffic stops to search people without warrants.

The Border Patrol operates about 170 checkpoints throughout the country. Checkpoints outside the El Paso sector are thought to be operating normally.

Border Patrol agents in El Paso said last week that they had apprehended more than 400 immigrants in the country illegally during a five-minute period. Most of them were unaccompanied youths or people traveling in family units, the agency said.

Immigrants recently released by federal authorities in South Texas overflowed a respite center run by Catholic Charities this month, bathing their babies in sinks and waiting in long lines for food, bus tickets and medical attention. The immigrants, most fleeing poverty and gang violence in Central America, described the conditions they faced in custody as cold and crowded.

President Donald Trump has pointed to the influx of migrants as evidence of a crisis justifying his call for building a wall on the border.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/25/us/border-checkpoints-texas.html" id="409c6224-635b-3ef7-a846-9c49e0561c6d">The New York Times</a>.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The Border Patrol is taking the unusual step of shutting down its interior checkpoints across New Mexico and a swath of West Texas as officials scramble to respond to a surge in families requesting asylum along the Southwest border.

Checkpoints Closed in New Mexico and West Texas Amid Influx of Migrants

A spokesman for the Border Patrol said the temporary measure was intended “to process and ensure appropriate care for those in custody.” The closing of checkpoints up to 100 miles inland from the border reflects the strain on border operations as the number of migrants entering the country continues to climb.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The Border Patrol is taking the unusual step of shutting down its checkpoints across New Mexico and a swath of West Texas as officials scramble to respond to a surge in families requesting asylum along the Southwest border.

Border Patrol Shuts Down Checkpoints in New Mexico and West Texas

A spokesman for the Border Patrol said in a statement that the temporary measure was intended “to process and ensure appropriate care for those in custody.” The closing of checkpoints up to 100 miles inland from the border reflects the strain on border operations as the number of migrants entering the country, which in February reached an 11-year high, continues to climb.

Authorities closed checkpoints across the Border Patrol’s El Paso, Texas, sector, which includes 121,000 square miles in New Mexico and 4,500 square miles in Texas, in order to free more agents to work directly on the border.

“To process and ensure appropriate care for those in custody, resources including personnel have been diverted from other border security priorities,” Customs and Border Protection officials said in a statement on the closings, first reported by Texas Monthly. “This is intended as a temporary measure. Checkpoints are integral to USBP’s border security mission.”

At some of the checkpoints on major highways, orange cones could be seen blocking off access to the roads, along which motorists normally are funneled to checkpoints for queries about citizenship status and visual inspection of vehicles.

Agents at the Border Patrol checkpoints arrest relatively few migrants in the country illegally, and most of those who are seeking asylum quickly surrender to authorities at the border. The agents at the checkpoints deal largely with seizures of marijuana and other drugs from motorists.

The checkpoints have emerged as a source of contention with human rights groups, which have contended that Border Patrol agents routinely ignore their legal authority during the traffic stops to search people without warrants. By law, agents must have probable cause to search the interior of a vehicle, though an alert from a drug-sniffing dog “legitimately” alerts to the presence of drugs, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

The influx of asylum-seekers is placing stress on immigration officials, volunteer shelters and religious charities along much of the Southwest border, as they struggle to assist the migrants.

“We do not have a way to care for the numbers who are coming,” Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said during a visit to South Texas this month. “We don’t have the facilities; we don’t have the legal processes; we don’t have the laws that enable us to quickly process their claims to protect them.”

“It was freezing,” Cecilio, a 31-year-old from Guatemala, said while sitting behind the respite center with his 7-year-old son. The Border Patrol’s processing centers, like the one in McAllen, Texas, where immigrants are housed temporarily after being apprehended, are known in the immigrant community as “las hieleras,” or iceboxes, because they are often kept so cold.

Authorities in most cases are supposed to hold immigrants for no longer than 72 hours, yet five immigrants last week interviewed by The New York Times said they were held longer than that. One of them, Cecilio, who asked to be referred to by only his first name, said he and his son were in custody for eight days.

But elected officials in parts of the borderlands, including Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, D-Texas, say that the recent mass releases of migrants without plans for housing them amounts to a fabricated crisis aimed at mustering support for the administration’s plans.

In any case, more migrant families are continuing to make their way toward the United States. A new caravan of about 1,200 migrants began moving toward the border over the weekend from southern Mexico.

Rappers celebrate her scoops, proclaiming that “she gets more love than our own city’s mayor.”

“I guess this makes me famous, huh?” said Villarreal, 34, a 10th-grade dropout with a shaved head, an abundance of tattoos and an impassioned 119,000-strong following on Facebook. She is arguably the most influential journalist in Laredo, a border city of 260,000.

Reporting in profanity-laced Spanglish and calling herself La Gordiloca, which roughly translates as the Crazy Fat Lady, Villarreal’s swift rise to prominence reflects how many people on the border now prefer to get their news — and just maybe, provides a glimpse at the future of journalism.

All the notoriety amounts to a big shift for Villarreal. Just a few years ago she was working part time for a wrecking crew removing scrap from tractor-trailer crash sites. She was struggling with depression and post-traumatic stress after losing a baby born prematurely.

But Villarreal embarked on a second career in muckraking in 2015. She has held local officials accountable — emerging victorious from a caustic legal battle with the Laredo Police Department over press freedom — and unearthed stories that were not being told.

“News on the Move,” she calls it.

Fans stop her on the street now to ask for autographs or selfies; Laredo eateries hire her to advertise their cuisine.

“She’s already something of a folk hero down there,” said Daxton Stewart, a journalism professor specializing in media law at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas. “What’s fascinating is that she’s doing it the old-fashioned way, but with new technologies, by breaking news the authorities just don’t want out there.”

LAREDO, Texas — Priscilla Villarreal roams the streets of Laredo in an old Dodge pickup, scrambling to drug busts and murder scenes to bring her tales from the dark side of the southwest border to her many viewers.

Simon Romero

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