Gov. Greg Abbott will be in the Rio Grande Valley on Wednesday to hold a press conference about the end of Title 42, a public health code that essentially blocked migrants from seeking asylum.
President Joe Biden announced last week that the administration would be phasing out Title 42, which was put in place to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
The Centers of Disease Control and Prevention implemented the policy during the height of the pandemic.
Abbott said in a media advisory that he will be joined by Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw, Adjutant General of Texas Maj. Gen. Thomas Suelzer and the Texas Division of Emergency Management (TDEM) Chief Nim Kidd to discuss the matter.
A news conference is scheduled for Wednesday afternoon in Weslaco.
Critics argue the end of Title 42 will lead to a surge in migration. The governor himself has also long been critical of the president’s handling of immigration matters.
On Tuesday, U.S. Customs and Border Protection said in a news release that Border Patrol has recently come across 802 migrants in six groups, noting that large groups are “becoming norm again” in the Valley.
In Rio Grande City on Monday evening, border agents in Rio Grande City encountered a group of 152 who were illegally in the country, CBP said.
Another 120 migrants were apprehended Tuesday morning near Roma; and over the weekend, agents encountered four large groups — which Border Patrol classifies as 100 or more migrants — of 527 people, according to federal authorities.
CBP also said that the migrants in several of these instances were identified as being from Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Cuba, Ecuador, Romania, Mexico, Cuba, Peru and Venezuela.
Editor’s note: This story was updated with the full version at 10:22 p.m.
