Opinion: U.S. Border Patrol agents are using reins like whips to round up Haitian immigrants in Del Rio, Texas. What happened to Biden’s more humane approach?
Corrections & Clarifications: The El Paso Times has updated its story quoted in this column to reflect that its reporter had witnessed at least one Border Patrol agent on horseback swing his reins like a whip.
Now U.S. Border Patrol agents are on horseback, whipping Haitian immigrants?
I couldn’t believe it. But it is true, and that is just revolting.
El Paso Times described the situation like this:
“As the Haitians tried to climb onto the U.S. side of the river Sunday afternoon, the agent shouted: ‘Let’s go! Get out now! Back to Mexico!’
“The agent menacingly swung his reins like a whip, charging his horse toward the men in the river who were trying to return to an encampment under the international bridge in Del Rio after buying food and water in Ciudad Acuña, Mexico.
Is this really America?
And is this really happening under a Democratic president who promised humane immigration methods after his Republican predecessor caged migrant children and sealed the U.S.-Mexico border to asylum seekers?
Biden is handling Del Rio all wrong
It’s just hard to fathom what’s happening. President Biden has a real problem, and he’s handling it in the worst possible way.
More than 10,000 mostly Haitians – some put that number up to 15,000 – flocked to Del Rio, Texas, seeking refuge from total chaos after multiple calamities struck their country.
Over the weekend, the White House began a massive deportation operation beginning with three flights that landed on Sunday at Haiti’s capital of Port au-Prince. Six flights are expected a day for three weeks, according to The New York Times.
The Biden administration is expelling the Haitians under Title 42, a health provision Trump invoked during the COVID-19 health pandemic. A judge halted its use but gave Biden two weeks to appeal, which he has.
I guess the White House is using any and all methods necessary to deport as many as fast as possible.
But agents on horseback, whipping them, round them up like cattle? There is lot of chatter on social media over whether the agents were using whips or reins. As if that would make it OK?
The whole tactic is just horrible. Nobody seeking asylum should be treated like an animal.
Trump was wrong, wrong, wrong to cage migrant children, and now Biden is no better. The president must call off his Border Patrol cowboys rounding up the Haitians.