White House: ‘Horrific’ to see border agents on horses chasing Haitian migrants, should ‘never’ happen
WASHINGTON — Pictures showing U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents chasing Haitian migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border on horseback Sunday are “horrific,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said, adding more information on the situation is needed.
“I’ve seen some of the footage, I don’t have the full context. I can’t imagine what context would make that appropriate, but I don’t have additional details, and certainly, … I don’t think anyone seeing that footage would think it was acceptable or appropriate,” Psaki said at Monday’s White House press briefing.
CBP agents charged migrants carrying only food and water and the clothes on their backs as they tried to scramble onto the U.S. side of the river.
“Let’s go! Get out now! Back to Mexico!” agents shouted. One man stumbled and fell as he tried to dodge an agent’s whip.
Read more:Haitian migrants face tough choices in Del Rio amid crackdown at Texas-Mexico border
When pressed on whether border patrol agents should be fired or allowed to do it again, Psaki said: “Of course they should never be able to do it again, I don’t know what the circumstances would be, it’s obviously horrific, the footage, I don’t have any more information on it so let me venture to do that and we’ll see if there’s more to convey.”
A camp of over 10,000 migrants who crossed the Rio Grande at a low point between Ciudad Acuña, Mexico and Del Rio, Texas, have been waiting beneath the international bridge in Del Rio to open an asylum claim. U.S. and Mexican officials warned Sunday that those in the camp would be deported back to Haiti.
“We are in the midst of a pandemic and a critical migration challenge,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told reporters Monday. “We continue to exercise the Centers for Disease Control (and Prevention’s) title 42 authority.”
Title 42 allows CBP to expel undocumented migrants to prevent the spread of COVID-19. It is “not an immigration authority, but a public health authority,” Mayorkas said.
Contributing: Rebecca Morin; Martha Pskowski, El Paso Times