(NewsNation) — Human smugglers working for cartels in Mexico are using rafts and air mattresses to float across the Rio Grande as border officials try to crack down on smuggling at the southern border.
Now, officials say even after smugglers get deported from the U.S., cartels continue to send them back because the foot guides know how to evade Border Patrol and get migrants into the U.S.
A 25-year-old from Honduras was recently deported back to Central America as many as four times. And last month, another suspected foot guide was removed from the country but was back moving people across the border illegally within days. He is now facing felony reentry charges.
Just days after he was caught again, another foot guide from Mexico was caught smuggling people into the country. The 23-year-old was initially removed in in May through Eagle Pass before he made his way back up the river to Acuña, a town near the Rio Grande.
Sources tell NewsNation these smugglers take a raft through a creek running through a thick brush and then disappear into the sea of warehouses and semitrucks in Acuña. Here, they are picked up by a load driver.
Law enforcement is also reporting criminal cartel members are stealing small boats on the U.S. side to help move people back and forth over the border. Meanwhile, the Border Patrol isn’t able to do anything because the smugglers end up back on the southern side of the border after they drop off migrants.