Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) Highway Patrol car keeps watch over the Rio Grande border with Mexico.Photo byTexas Department of Public Safety (DPS)

Some disturbing reports are emerging about the plight of migrant kids along the U.S. Border with Mexico. The Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) says their troopers have recovered over 900 children who were left abandoned or found smuggled in vehicles along the Texas-Mexico Border alone. Nationwide, the DPS says 320,000 unaccompanied children are unaccounted for who have crossed the border into the United States.

When you look at some of the individual stories involving those children, the situation becomes even more horrifying:

This nine-year-old Honduran boy was rescued by U.S. & Mexican authorities after being held for ransom in Juarez, Mexico last month.Photo byU.S. Homeland Security Investigations

For example: last month U.S. Homeland Security Investigators (HSI) in El Paso, Texas worked with their Mexican counterparts to rescue a nine-year-old Honduran boy who was being held for ransom by a Mexican Cartel in a stash house in Juarez. The child has since been returned to his country.

In San Luis, Arizona U.S. Customs & Border Protection (CBP) Officers discovered that two Mexican children "asleep" in the back of a car being driven across the border from San Luis Rio Colorado (Sonora) had been drugged by a U.S. citizen claiming them as her children as she attempted to drive them across the border into that state.

19 "unaccompanied minors" taken into custody by Texas DPS Officers in Maverick County along the Texas-Mexico Border (May, 2024)Photo byTexas Department of Public Safety

Back in Texas, DPS Officers & U.S. Border Patrol Agents have been dealing with the plight of "unaccompanied minors" along the border with Mexico for some time now.

Three-month-old boy and two-year-old girl from Honduras abandoned on the Rio Grande in Texas near Eagle Pass (Sept. 14. 2021)Photo byU.S. Customs & Border Protection

The ages of some of these abandoned children is shocking. In 2021, Border Patrol Agents found a three-month-old boy and a two-year-old girl from Honduras abandoned by smugglers (and left for dead) on the banks of the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass, Texas.

In 2022, the Border Patrol took custody of 152,000 unaccompanied children at or near the U.S.-Mexico Border. Most of the children were from Central America.

In March, 2022 more than 8,000 unaccompanied children taken into custody at the border have been turned over to adult sponsors in Texas, more than any other U.S. state.

U.S. Border Patrol Agent comforts an "unaccompanied minor" at a Central Processing Facility in Donna, Texas (July, 2019)Photo byU.S. Customs & Border Protection

More often than not, the children abandoned by human smugglers along the Texas Border with Mexico are a bit older - but that does not make their plight any less hazardous.

Unaccompanied Guatemalan children who crossed Rio Grande into Eagle Pass present officers with U.S. relatives' contact info (Feb. 2024)Photo byTexas Department of Public Safety

Most of the children present officers from Texas, Arizona, and Federal Agents with contact information for relatives in the U.S. - although some critics worry about the accuracy of that information.

In the 2024 Fiscal Year alone, Del Rio (Texas) Sector Border Patrol agents have encountered nearly 11,000 unaccompanied children.Photo byU.S. Border Patrol

The numbers are staggering. For example, in the 2024 Fiscal Year alone, Del Rio (Texas) Sector Border Patrol agents have encountered nearly 11,000 unaccompanied children.

Border Patrol Agents in the Rio Grande Valley Sector have encountered 21,000 unaccompanied children so far this fiscal year.

Children crossing the border alone into Texas is not a new trend - the photo below is of two Honduran brothers who crossed in Del Rio by themselves last year:

Honduran brothers (ages 4 & 12) abandoned by criminal smugglers along the Rio Grande in Eagle Pass, Texas (Augisy 2023)Photo byTexas Department of Public Safety

Is enough being done to protect children being smuggled into the U.S. along our Southern Border?

Share your opinion in the comments on this article!

For more stories like this "Follow Me" on the Newsbreak App and "Like" this article to stay up to date on immigration and border security issues regularly covered by Jack Beavers on Newsbreak like these:

• Texas Border: Truckloads of Migrants Found
• Fed Cartel Cocaine Crackdown on U.S. Border
• Migrant Stash Houses Border Busts
• Cartel Booby Traps Target Border Patrol Agents

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