(The Center Square) – Texas Gov. Greg Abbott surged additional Texas military resources to the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) to assist President Donald Trump with his border security efforts.
Abbott did so as removal operations are already underway in Trump’s first week in office after he issued a series of executive orders to secure the border, including sending 1,500 troops to Texas and California, The Center Square reported.
Abbott directed the Texas Military Department to deploy the Texas Tactical Border Force to the RGV to coordinate efforts with U.S. Border Patrol agents.
More than 400 troops are departing from military bases in Fort Worth and Houston Monday morning, as well as C-130s and Chinook helicopters, to join thousands of Texas National Guard soldiers already stationed at the Texas-Mexico border.
“Texas has a partner in the White House we can work with to secure the Texas-Mexico border,” Abbott said. “For the past four years, Texas held the line against the Biden Administration’s border crisis and their refusal to protect Americans. Finally, we have a federal government working to end this crisis. I thank President Donald Trump for his decisive leadership on the southern border and look forward to working with him and his Administration to secure the border and make America safe again.”
Abbott first deployed the border force in May 2023 to the RGV and El Paso to support his border security mission, Operation Lone Star, The Center Square reported.
Under OLS, thousands of Texas National Guard soldiers and Texas Department of Public Safety troopers have been deployed to the Texas-Mexico border since March 2021. Abbott also received the support of 25 Republican governors, who also sent troops to Texas to participate in OLS.
“We have shifted troops to hotspots, added additional drone teams, and increased miles of barrier along the border. The dedication of these troops to the State of Texas is inspirational,” Texas Military Department Major General Thomas Suelzer said when the border force was first deployed in 2023. They included quick reaction forces comprised of military police units in El Paso and another to cover the region stretching from San Antonio to the Rio Grande Valley.
Last year, Texas Military Department efforts expanded after Texas built its first modern-day military base at the U.S. border in Eagle Pass, Texas, the only National Guard base along Texas’ border with Mexico, The Center Square reported.
Texas’ Forward Operating Base camp houses 1,800 troops with the ability to expand up to 2,300 if needed. Since then, military forces have been consolidated, enabling troops to expand barrier construction and other operations.
Since March 2021, when OLS was launched, more than 10,000 Texas National Guard troops and Texas Department of Public Safety troopers have been deployed to the Texas-Mexico border.
Through OLS, they’ve built more than 240 miles of border barriers, constructed 100 miles of border wall, installed and fortified 200 miles of concertina wire barriers, and installed marine buoy barriers, including additional barriers last week. Attempts by the Biden administration to prevent Texas’s construction of concertina wire and buoy barriers failed in court.
OLS officers alone have apprehended more than 530,000 illegal border crossers, repelled over 140,000 attempted illegal entries, made more than 50,000 criminal arrests, with more than 43,000 felony charges reported, and seized enough lethal doses of fentanyl to kill everyone in the U.S., Mexico and Canada combined, according to data from the governor’s office.
After Texas’ first Border Czar Mike Banks expanded OLS efforts, a 51% drop in federal border apprehensions was reported in one year in Texas, The Center Square exclusively reported.
Within that first year, as Texas resistance grew, illegal entries increased in Arizona, California and New Mexico, The Center Square exclusively reported.
