Valley Congressman Thompson gets first-hand look at Texas-Mexico border

Over the last few days, U.S. House Rep. Glenn Thompson, R-15, Bellefonte, has had a first hand look at what is occurring on the Texas-Mexico border.

Thompson was part of a delegation of more than 60 Republican House members in Texas from Tuesday to Thursday. He visited the border town of Eagle Pass, the epicenter of the crisis, on Wednesday.

It’s a crisis of epic proportions, he said on Thursday night, from O’Hare Airport in Chicago while on his way home.

“What I saw was the toll that this crisis was taking on border agents,” he said. “What I saw was the policies that worked from 2016-2020 and that were abandoned by the Biden administration, have led to this.

“When we showed up with a record number of representatives, including five from Pennsylvania, the numbers of people at the border reduced dramatically,” Thompson said. “Quite frankly it just shows the control the cartels are having and they were able to turn that faucet of immigrants at the border down, and redirect into other sections when our group arrived.”

While in Eagle Pass, Thompson said, “we got reports of how chaotic it has been. The stress on the border patrol. The number of suicides; the amount of work they are doing, and the frustrations they are experiencing.”

The numbers were very light, he said, “and I think that was purposeful. I think that was planned for us by the cartels when they knew sixty-plus congressmen were coming to the border.”

The U.S. border protection is really at a breaking point, Thompson said, “and that is something I saw.”

Thompson said he hoped that Senate Democrats and Republicans were working on a bipartisan solution to the crisis.