WASHINGTON — The Biden administration plans to send 1,500 active-duty soldiers to the U.S.-Mexico border for 90 days, federal officials announced Monday.
The move comes ahead of the anticipated increase of migrants arriving at the southern border when a pandemic-related border policy expires next week, though U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials said service members would not perform law enforcement functions or interact with migrants in custody.
About 2,500 National Guard members are already stationed at all nine sectors of the southwest border doing support work with U.S. Customs and Border Protection, one official said. The new increase will bring the total to 4,000 military personnel on the border.
Officials said the 1,500 troops requested by the Department of Homeland Security, will fill critical “capability gaps,” such as watching for crossings, monitoring camera feeds, data entry and warehouse support, until the agency can replace them with contractors.
“(Department of Defense) personnel have been supporting CBP at the border for almost two decades now, so this is a common practice,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters at Tuesday’s briefing.
“This would not be necessary if Congress would act,” she added.
Title 42 orders are expected to end May 11. The policy was implemented amid the COVID-19 pandemic and prevented migrants from requesting asylum, allowing border agents to swiftly return many of them back to Mexico.
DHS said in a statement that the request for more troops is due to an anticipated increase in arrivals of migrants attempting to enter the U.S. Support from the troops will free up DHS personnel to fulfill their own law enforcement duties, officials said.
“Military personnel will not directly participate in law enforcement activities,” Pentagon press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said in a statement. “This deployment to the border is consistent with other forms of military support to DHS over many years.”
The DHS said in a statement that the Department of Defense has offered support on the border every year since 2006.
In 2018, President Donald Trump sent 5,800 active-duty military troops to the southern border amid the arrival of a caravan of thousands of Central American migrants, which he characterized as an “invasion.” Initially the troops laid razor wire and conducted other tasks, but later the White House expanded the troops’ authority, allowing them to use force and provide crowd control when necessary to protect border agents.
Biden on Thursday signed an executive order “on authority to order the Ready Reserve of the Armed Forces to active duty to address international drug trafficking.” The order builds on another from December 2021, which declared an emergency to address the national security threats posed by cross-border narcotics trafficking.
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(Los Angeles Times staff writer Courtney Subramanian and San Diego Union-Tribune staff writer Kate Morrissey contributed to this report.)
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