On the border in Eagle Pass, Texas
Reporting from the banks of the Rio Grande
card: 1 of 8
Reporting from the banks of the Rio Grande
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Reporting from the banks of the Rio Grande
card: 1 of 8
Kenny Holston
Reporting from the banks of the Rio Grande
Earlier this week, I watched a family of migrants wading from Mexico across the icy Rio Grande to Eagle Pass, Texas, just as Speaker Mike Johnson was holding a press conference on the riverbank.
The family was part of a wave of migrants crossing the border illegally in recent months in what members of Congress are calling a crisis.
Speaker Johnson and more than 60 House Republicans traveled to the border to make their case for tighter border restrictions in exchange for aid to Ukraine.
The border area that was packed with migrants a few days earlier remained empty during their visit. The number of border crossings can be unpredictable and the number of illegal border crossings decreases around the holidays. The press conference itself could have been a deterrent.
Law enforcement officers on airboats help people in the river and shout instructions in Spanish. The roaring boats also deter migrants from crossing.
After asylum seekers turn themselves in to agents at the border, they are taken to immigration processing centers. From there, they are often released into private shelters and then move to other parts of the country.
I watched as the family boarded a bus that would take them to a processing center. There seemed to be a sense of relief that they had reached the US, but also a sense of tension.
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