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El Paso Cleans Migrant Camps Ahead of Visit By President Biden

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OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.


The city of El Paso is putting its best face on for President Joe Biden who is finally making a visit to the Southern border.

The city has been cleaning up migrant encampments that have been languishing, ahead of the president’s photo op visit, The New York Post reported.

Encampments near the downtown bus station and the Sacred Heart Church, which operates a shelter, have been dismantled by local authorities over the last two nights as the city prepares to host President Biden’s first visit to the southern border, according to a photographer for The Post who witnessed it.

Six buses loaded with mostly Venezuelan migrants were spotted crossing a downtown bridge to Ciudad Juarez, the frontier city in Mexico, Saturday, as police escorted dozens more to a pedestrian crossing.

A Border Patrol agent who did not want to be identified told The Post that 200 people were sent back to Mexico Saturday.

“People are saying that if you are out in the streets the Border Patrol will get you and deport you because the President is coming to El Paso and they don’t want to show him the reality of things,” said Venezuelan migrant Maria Rodriguez said to The Post.

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She said that for the past three days she has been living in a dumpster in El Paso.

“I hope we get shelter tonight because it took us a lot of courage to go out of that dumpster after three days…We just don’t want to keep running. All we are asking is for one chance,” she said.

Another Venezuelan migrant, Joan Enriquez, 21, said he had been sleeping on the steps of a church and is furious with President Biden for making false promises.

“I really think politicians are playing with us,” he said. “Both side, Democrats and Republicans. We are props to them because like Biden, he first said he wanted to help us, and then he shut the border down and we can’t find a way to get legal in this country.”

And critics are seizing on the cleaning of the camps by El Paso authorities saying that they are attempting to cover up what is really happening.

“El Paso being cleaned up as if nothing unusual ever happened there. Just in time for Biden’s ‘visit to the border’.  We suggest just landing in Des Moines, Iowa and telling him it’s El Paso. He’ll never know the difference,” the Border Patrol Union said.

“El Paso rushes to remove illegal immigrants and migrant camps that are crowding downtown before Biden arrives. Predictable. Biden does not want America to see the chaos that he has caused on the border. This is just a photo op and a game of pretend,” Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said.

“Joe Biden is visiting El Paso today but the El Paso that will be shown to the media is not the real El Paso that we live in every day. They’ve spent days clearing out the illegals, cleaning up the trash and making it look like we’re not in crisis. WE ARE IN A CRISIS,” Border Security Coalition President Irene Armendariz-Jackson said.

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“El Paso clears downtown of expansive migrant camps ahead of Biden visit. Why not show him what our border community and law enforcement officials are dealing with on a daily basis,” former Republican Rep. Mayra Flores said.

“It’s pretty messed up Democrats and the city of El Paso complained about how the migrant situation is out of control, but when Biden decided to come, they tore down migrant camps all over the city so he wouldn’t see. Show him what’s going on or zip it,” Kambree Nelson said.

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“It’s very unfortunate that the clean-up started earlier this week. I spoke to officials yesterday and they notified me that there was absolutely zero community releases from the Border Patrol. So, what that means is that when the Border Patrol has these encounters they take them, they process them, and they release them into the city of El Paso and we had zero,” former El Paso councilmember Claudia Rodriguez said on Fox News.

“Border Patrol agents began to clear El Paso. I’m sure that they are just as disappointed because the whole purpose of President Biden coming to El Paso is for him to see firsthand the mess that is going on … something that has never happened in El Paso before. Mind you, we are a city of immigrants. We have people coming into our community every single day and they’re coming here legally. Everybody in El Paso has a migration story and it defeats the purpose of President Biden coming to El Paso by cleaning up the streets the way they are,” she said.

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