More On: Texas migrant-truck
Mayorkas said this about how well the Biden administration is doing at the southern border: 'I think we're doing a good job'
In the Texas migrant-truck tragedy, a top Biden official blame the victims
On Sunday, Homeland Security chief Alejandro Mayorkas seemed to blame the 53 people who died in last week's migrant truck disaster by saying that the Biden administration had told people trying to cross the border many times how dangerous it is.
Mayorkas was trying to stop people from saying that the administration's "lax" border policies were to blame for the tragedy.
"We have told people many times not to take the dangerous trip, and we will continue to do so," Mayorkas said on CBS News' "Face the Nation."
"We saw in San Antonio, Texas, one of the terrible things that could happen on that dangerous trip, and so many people don't even make it that far when they're in the hands of smugglers who take advantage of them."
He said that trafficking cartels give false information to migrants from Central and South America before they make the trip to the US-Mexico border.
Mayorkas said, "They put their lives and their savings in the hands of these exploitative, criminal groups that don't care about their lives and only want to make money."
On Monday, a hot 18-wheeler was found abandoned on the side of a remote road in San Antonio. Inside, the bodies of dozens of dead migrants were found stacked, and several more bodies were found nearby.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said that the 53 people who died in the migrant truck tragedy last week were to blame.
Even though it got as hot as 103 degrees, the truck's air conditioning didn't work.
The driver and one of his friends have been charged with a crime.
After the tragedy, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott was one of the first people to blame the Biden administration.
“These deaths are on Biden,” Abbott seethed on Twitter late Monday. “They are a result of his deadly open border policies.
“They show the deadly consequences of his refusal to enforce the law,” the Republican governor added.
Authorities said that the truck had crossed the border in Laredo, about 150 miles south of where it was found. It had been "cloned" to look like a legal vehicle owned by a local trucking company.
Asked by CBS’ Margaret Brennan how the truck was able to cross into the US, Mayorkas said the smugglers have become more sophisticated over the past decades.
“They have evolved over the last 30 years. … Now, they are very sophisticated using technology, and they’re extraordinarily organized transnational criminal enterprises. And we are much more sophisticated using technology and personnel 24 hours a day,” he said.
He admitted that smugglers can use "sophisticated means" to get a truck across the border, but he also said that the US is stepping up its efforts to stop them by using technology and more people.
“But I have to say, we have interdicted more drugs at the ports of entry than ever before. We’ve rescued more migrants. We’re seeing a challenge that is really regional, hemispheric in scope, and we’re addressing it accordingly,” Mayorkas said.
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