Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) officials discovered a 2-year-old girl from El Salvador traveling alone with only a piece of paper bearing a phone number, highlighting the growing crisis of unaccompanied migrant children at the southern border.
Lt. Chris Olivarez told NewsNation that the child was one of 60 unaccompanied minors found in Eagle Pass. The ages of the other minors ranged from 2 to 17 years old.
The little girl had a single piece of paper with her name and phone number on it. She said her parents were already in the United States.
Olverez said, “We do not know who this little girl is going to end up with or who that person is behind that phone number.”
A report from the Department of Homeland Security in August showed that between 2019 and 2023, more than 32,000 unaccompanied children did not show up to their immigration hearings, and another nearly 300,000 never got a court date.
The child was checked for signs of abuse and then given to Border Patrol, who did not know where she was going next.
Olivarez thought that the rise in migration might have something to do with possible changes in politics, pointing to “desperation to get more kids across by themselves” as a new administration gets ready to take office.
The Texas DPS said they met 211 immigrants in Maverick County. This included the 60 children who were not with an adult and the six people who came from Mali and Angola.
Olivarez wrote on X, “This is a stark example of the dangerous journey these children make,” pointing out the dangers of human trafficking and how vulnerable children are when they are alone.
During Operation Lone Star, the agency says it saved more than 900 children from being left alone or being smuggled.
A Republican from Louisiana named Sen. Bill Cassidy put out a report last week saying that “failures” by President Joe Biden’s administration have caused the “exploitation and abuse of migrant children.”
Cassidy started a formal investigation more than a year and a half ago into the administration’s policies on how to treat and care for children who are alone after he said he saw a scary rise in child labor.