El Paso scrambles to tear down migrant camps ahead of Biden border visit

The West Texas town of El Paso is scrambling to dismantle the expansive migrant camps that have covered the town as President Joe Biden is slated to visit the town to survey the situation at the southern border.

The city has become host to many migrants, with tents and supplies strewn about the streets. El Paso police and Border Patrol agents have cleared out several of these camps and moved the migrants out of eyesight, four law enforcement officials told the Washington Examiner.

The Examiner's sources indicated that the migrants' activities had begun to make life more difficult for the residents of the time, who had pushed officials to address the issue.

"The [townspeople] that experienced it on a daily basis were fed up and they made it known," one source told the Examiner. "Crime was getting bad and many residents were complaining. Some migrants even took over private parking lots and were charging for people to use them for parking."

Biden announced earlier this week that he would make the trip, nearly two years after he had taken office. In that timeframe, roughly 4 million illegal migrants have entered the U.S. with a record 2.4 million entering in fiscal year 2022 alone. The Biden administration has made several rollbacks of Trump-era migration policies designed to stem the tide of illegal migration, but has repeatedly insisted that the border is not open.

El Paso has born the brunt of the migrant influx, with caravans arriving at the city en masse. In mid-December one such caravan of 1,000 migrants on 20 busses made their way into the city.