Cruz: Immigration, trafficking at southern border 'worst plague of slavery' since Civil War

Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz is at the U.S.-Mexico border this week where he continues to blame the Biden administration for ongoing problems with illegal immigration – including what he calls a "narco slave trade."

In a video from the border, Cruz said Monday that children coming into the U.S. owe cartels thousands of dollars for smuggling them into the country.

"And the teenage boys work for the gangs in every city in America," he continued. "And the teenage girls experience a hell worse than that with far too many of them human-trafficked into sex slavery."

Cruz also said President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are "responsible for the worst plague of slavery in America since the Civil War."

As photos of dead migrants flashed across the video, including that of a child, Cruz said, "This is not compassionate. This is not humane. This is barbaric."

He was specifically hitting against the Biden-Harris administration's claims that their policies are more compassionate and humane than those proposed by Republicans.

U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agents have encountered a record number of more than 2 million illegal migrants this fiscal year. This does not include the estimated more than 1 million "gotaways" who came into the Untied States undetected.

The United Nations International Organization for Migration earlier this month named the U.S.-Mexico border as the world's deadliest land crossing.

More than 700 people are known to have died there in 2021.