The unaddressed border crisis added a new normal for travelers as hundreds of illegal aliens were encountered at a California airport sleeping in a terminal.
(Video: KSWB)
While President Joe Biden preoccupied himself with slow-walking efforts to free American hostages in Gaza and bungling Israel’s operations to manage their own border security, the disregard for our own national sovereignty was playing out at San Diego International Airport.
Holiday travelers coming and going for their Thanksgiving plans were privy to more than 300 aliens said to be sleeping at the airport as they made their own way to final destinations across the country.
On Thursday, KSWB reported witnessing dozens getting dropped off by the busload at the airport’s Terminal 2 where many were arriving hours and sometimes days ahead of scheduled flights only to set up camp and sleep there.
“We would initially make just about 50 sandwiches, 50 meal packs for people. But then, we realized that was not enough. Last week, I counted 308 people sleeping over,” Roni Elias, a volunteer with the We All We Got mutual aid group told the outlet.
Krystle Johnson, another volunteer with the group, told the San Diego Union-Tribune, “It’s grown exponentially, and we’re not totally sure why. It’s almost becoming a second (migrant welcome) center because there’s so many people there.”
As the volunteers handed out basic goods and hygiene kits, Elias noted that the aliens were typically coming directly from U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) screenings where they are then sent on their way.
“They seem to be coming directly from CBP 1 interviews when they get released. I ask them and it’s mostly families and children coming from immigration,” she claimed and voiced, “Our biggest concern is all the children that are there and the vulnerable populations that are sleeping there.”
Meanwhile, the Union-Tribune noted a comment from Joel Velasco Salazar, one of three Ecuadorian men traveling together who lamented, “We need food.”
Johnson contended, “sometimes there’s confusion, and people say they have a flight but what they meant is they’re waiting for money to get their flight, and the airport is just a really confusing place.”
While Elias had detailed over 300 one night, the Immigrant Defenders Law Center told the Union-Tribune that the average night the week prior ranged from 100 to 200 aliens sleeping at the airport and, of 133 there the Saturday before Thanksgiving, only 10 were children.
“Since late last year, San Diego International Airport has experienced a significant increase in the number of migrants using the airport to proceed to their next destination,” the airport said in a statement to the newspaper. “We have and will continue to coordinate with migrant-serving volunteer groups and nonprofit organizations as they help their clients navigate the airport.”
As the volunteers reported hundreds of aliens sleeping at the airport Thursday, CBP’s San Diego Sector Border Patrol shared their own update on the crisis as they announced having “seized more than $3.5M worth of fentanyl pills during a vehicle stop. Agents discovered 62 bundles of blue pills concealed inside its door panels and seats following a K9 alert.”
San Diego Sector Border Patrol agents seized more than $3.5M worth of fentanyl pills during a vehicle stop. Agents discovered 62 bundles of blue pills concealed inside its door panels and seats following a K9 alert. #FrontlineAgainstFentanyl
Read: https://t.co/qk4DBanykj pic.twitter.com/U1inZER3AD
— CBP (@CBP) November 25, 2023
The seizure came the same week that Swanton Sector Border Patrol Agents operating along the Canadian border with New Hampshire, Vermont and Eastern New York reported a 550% increase in apprehensions in their sector as encounters represented nearly 80 different countries for Fiscal Year 2023.
Native of Brooklyn, NY, Kevin Haggerty is a graduate of Hunter College where he studied Cultural Anthropology and Geography. An avid reader and truth seeker, he currently resides in Texas with his wife and their dog and, when he isn't researching current events and their impacts, you'll find him spending time with friends and family or working on his next novel.
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