Every week, hundreds of migrants make the dangerous journey from Latin America to the U.S. border. The journey is even more concerning for a group of children.

“The stories are all the same, their parents send them north because they want them to survive," said Margo Cowan with Keep Tucson Together. "Whether it’s starvation or the horrific violence in their countries of origin.”

Cowan frequently works with unaccompanied minors to prevent deportation.

“There are legal mechanisms that allow people to present themselves at the border and apply for asylum, and it shouldn’t be a hostile environment,” Cowan said.

Latin American families are making use of this legal process. Last week, the Tucson Sector of Border Patrol processed around 107 unaccompanied migrant children.

“Smuggling organizations will bring these people and children, sometimes toddlers to these places in the middle of the desert, in the middle of nowhere,” said Jesus Vasavilbaso, a U.S. Border Patrol Agent.

An agent at the Tucson sector says they don't usually deal with children migrants. Around 85% of migrants encountered at the tucson sector are adults that have to be tracked down and apprehended. Recent groups of children came from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, led by smugglers to turn themselves in to Border Patrol.

“The smuggling organizations sell this to the migrants saying that when you show up to the border, you just turn yourself in to Border Patrol, and they just let you in,” Vasavilbaso said.

But that’s not always how it works. The Tucson sector did a medical exam on each child then sent them to either health and human services or the office of refugee resettlement. Now those children have been sent to family members, child protective services, or back home.

This story was originally published by KGUN in Tucson, Arizona.

SAN DIEGO —

The recent deaths of an 8-year-old Panamanian girl and 17-year-old boy from Honduras who were under U.S. government supervision have again raised questions about how prepared authorities are to handle medical emergencies suffered by migrants arriving in the U.S., especially as agencies struggle with massive overcrowding at facilities along the southern border.

Video above: Migrants ride so-called 'Train of Death' hoping to make it to U.S.

Anadith Tanay Reyes Alvarez became unresponsive on a what was at least a third visit to medics Wednesday at a Border Patrol station in Harlingen, Texas, and died later in a hospital, U.S. Customs and Protection said. The girl had complained that day of vomiting and stomach pains.

She died on her family's ninth day in custody; the most time allowed is 72 hours under agency policy.

The family told agents that the girl had a history of heart problems and sickle cell anemia, CBP acknowledged in its second statement on the death. She was diagnosed with influenza on the family's sixth day in custody, which prompted them to be move to another station.

CBP published a detailed account on Sunday, confirming key aspects of what the girl's mother said two days earlier in an interview with The Associated Press. It initially published only a brief statement.

Mabel Alvarez Benedicks told the AP that agents repeatedly ignored pleas to hospitalize her medically fragile daughter as she felt pain in her bones, struggled to breathe and was unable to walk. She said the daughter was finally taken in ambulance after falling limp and unconscious and bleeding from the mouth.

Agents said her daughter's diagnosis of influenza did not require hospital care, according to the mother.

The girl's death came a week after 17-year-old Ángel Eduardo Maradiaga Espinoza of Honduras died in U.S. Health and Human Services Department custody. He was traveling alone.

WHY ARE SO MANY PEOPLE IN BORDER PATROL CUSTODY?

A rush to the border before pandemic-related asylum limits known as Title 42 expired brought extraordinary pressure. The Border Patrol took an average of 10,100 people a into custody a day the second week of May, compared to a daily average of 5,200 in March.

The Border Patrol had 28,717 people in custody on May 10, one day before pandemic asylum restrictions expired, which was double from two weeks earlier, according to a court filing. By Sunday, the custody count dropped 23% to 22,259, still historically high.

Custody capacity is about 17,000, according to a government document last year, and the administration has been adding temporary giant tents like one in San Diego that opened in January with room for about 500 people.

Those who qualify to be released from custody to pursue asylum are processed for immigration court, which takes 90 minutes to two hours for a single adult and longer for families and creates severe bottlenecks.

By contrast, it takes only 20 minutes to release someone with instructions to report to an immigration office in 60 days, a common practice in 2021 and 2022. A federal judge in Florida who ordered an end to quick releases in March also blocked the administration's attempt to resume them last week in what officials described as an necessary emergency response to overcrowding.

Amid this month's surge, hundreds of migrants slept on the ground, many for days, on U.S. soil between two border walls in San Diego as hundreds more holed up in a remote mountainous area east of the city in huts made of tree branches. The agency provided a limited diet of water and chips or granola bars. Pedro Rios, director of the American Friends Service Committee's U.S.-Mexico border program, said the Border Patrol told him to call 911 when volunteers encountered an 8-month-old between the walls who was "listless and vomiting."

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN SOMEONE IS TAKEN INTO CUSTODY?

Border Patrol holding facilities are short-term, with people sleeping on floormats with foil blankets. Thick plastic curtains have replaced chain-link fences to prohibit free movement.

Single adults may be transferred to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to be deported, released in the U.S. with notices to appear in immigration court or held for long-term detention.

ICE had nearly 26,000 people in long-term detention in April. Its facilities resemble prisons and often are prisons, operated by local police agencies or prison companies like CoreCivic and The Geo Group Inc.

The government generally cannot hold families more than 20 days under a 2015 court order. President Joe Biden broke with predecessors Donald Trump and Barack Obama by refusing to detain families at all beyond their initial 72 hours with the Border Patrol. His administration recently adopted curfews with electronic monitoring for families released in four cities until they pass initial asylum screenings.

Children traveling alone are transferred to the U.S. Health and Human Services Department, which generally places them with parents or relatives after short stays in contracted holding facilities. In 2021, the department was unprepared to take children in 72 hours, causing them to languish in Border Patrol care. It eventually contracted for convention centers in California, military bases in Texas and other temporary sites.

The Border Patrol returns some migrants who do not qualify for release in the U.S. to Mexico, including Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, as well as Mexicans.

To deport non-Mexicans, ICE runs charter flights and, in rare cases, flies commercial. In April, ICE chartered 117 flights, including 33 to Guatemala, 21 to Colombia, 20 to Ecuador and 17 to Honduras, according to Witness at the Border, an advocacy group that relies on flight data.

WHAT MEDICAL CARE IS AVAILABLE AT BORDER PATROL HOLDING FACILITIES?

The Border Patrol's parent agency, Customs and Border Protection, created a chief medical officer position in 2020 but services are limited. During a tour of a major holding center in McAllen this month, officials said they had about 100 medications on hand and that 23% of detainees had medical needs. The center has a medical booth and a more private exam room with two stethoscopes hanging on the wall.

Medical personnel screen for infectious disease — a critical job during COVID-19. They also ensure detainees have needed medications, deliver babies and respond to any need that can avoid a trip to the hospital.

Its facilities added more than 1,000 "medical contractors" in the last two years, Troy Miller, CBP acting commissioner, said Sunday. He promised "immediate action to review and, where needed, strengthen practices to ensure immediate and appropriate care is being provided to all individuals, especially those who are medically at-risk."

ARE CURRENT CHALLENGES NEW?

No, and the growing presence of families and unaccompanied children at the border over the last decade has presented U.S. authorities with enormous responsibilities for medical care.

At least six children died during a roughly yearlong period from 2018 to 2019 during the Trump administration; they were held in either Border Patrol or Health and Human Services custody. In March, a 4-year-old "medically fragile" Honduran girl who was in the care of the Health and Human Services died in a Michigan hospital three days after cardiac arrest.

In 2019, amid a previous surge of border crossings, the Homeland Security Department's internal watchdog observed 750 adults crammed in a space for 125 in El Paso, Texas. People stood on toilets for space to breathe. Another watchdog report in 2019 from Rio Grande Valley found that men were held in standing-room only for a week and some children under 7 were in overcrowded conditions more than two weeks.

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Associated Press writer Rebecca Santana in Washington contributed.

Despite scorching temperatures, migrants continue to arrive at the southern border in ever-growing numbers.

“You can't compare this current surge to anything that's happened in the past,” said Brandon Judd, president of the National Border Patrol Council. 

Judd tells Newsy the surge is severely overwhelming the roughly 18,000 agents he represents.  

“Over the weekend we were holding 10,000 people in custody. We don't have the number of agents to watch 10,000 people,” Judd said. 

New government estimates show last month the U.S. took into custody around 210,000 migrants — the highest monthly total in over 20 years and a significant increase from previous months. 

As a result, Border Patrol facilities are now up to 700% over capacity. That means more officers supervising migrants in custody and less agents patrolling the border.

“Our agents aren't actually on the border doing the job they were hired to do,” Judd said, adding that one agent could be assigned to watch 600 immigrants.

“There's no way in the world that one person is going to be able to ensure the safety and protection of all of those 600 people in that pod," he said.

Judd has been in the Border Patrol for over 20 years and was a supporter and close ally of President Donald Trump. 

While some observers point to unrest in Central America and beyond as the driving force behind the migration surge, Judd blames President Biden’s policies. 

“People are crossing the border illegally knowing that they're going to be released into the United States never to have to leave this country,” Judd said.  

The Biden administration is keeping in place a Trump policy allowing it to expel most migrants during the pandemic. But it’s also releasing into the country an increasing number of families and unaccompanied children.  

Judd says that’s not only encouraging more people to migrate, it’s also a COVID hazard.  

“In the Rio Grande Valley right now, we've got over 80 agents that are out with COVID-19,” he said. 

At the same time, his union supports agents who are hesitant to get vaccines they consider “experimental.” 

NEWSY'S BEN SCHAMISSO: "I'm not sure I follow how you can be concerned with COVID-19 on the one hand, and on the other hand also understand why some agents would refuse to be vaccinated."  

JUDD: “There's other mitigating ways that you can take care of COVID: You can wear PPE, you can social distance, you can do all of those different things to mitigate COVID.” 

As for the Biden White House, it blames Donald Trump’s dismantling of the asylum system for the rush at the border. 

Administration officials say they’re working hard to rebuild a "fair, orderly, and humane immigration system, including by expanding lawful pathways to the United States and discouraging irregular migration.” 

This story was originally reported by Ben Schamisso on Newsy.com.

WASHINGTON —

White House press secretary Jen Psaki declined to provide a specific date for when the media will get access to Border Patrol facilities temporarily holding thousands of migrant children seeking to live in the United States, but said Sunday the Biden administration was committed to transparency and "we're working to get that done as soon as we can."

More than 16,000 unaccompanied children were in government custody as of Thursday, including about 5,000 in substandard Customs and Border Protection facilities.

Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill have been calling on the administration to open the facilities to the cameras, asserting that the current policy is designed to keep the public from "fully realizing" what is happening at the border.

Republican officials are also blaming the Biden administration for actions they say are leading more people from Central America to seek entry into the United States. "It's not a crisis, it's a complete loss of sovereignty down there," Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said.

Graham recently visited the border and said he saw a facility designed to hold 80 children with about 1,000 in it. He called on the administration to turn away every unaccompanied minor after testing them for "human trafficking abuses."

"If you don't, we'll have 150,000 a month by this summer," Graham said Sunday.

U.S. authorities reported encounters with more than 100,000 migrants on the southern border in February, the highest since a four-month streak in 2019.

Encounters have averaged about 5,000 people per day throughout March, which would be about a 50% increase over February if those figures hold for the entire month.

White House communications director Kate Bedingfield said the surge was cyclical.

"They're not the result of one administration's policies or another administration's policies. They're the result of, for example, weather disasters in the region. They're the result of people fleeing poverty and violence," Bedingfield said. "So we saw spikes in 2014. We saw them in 2019 when the Trump administration had perhaps the cruelest imaginable policies in place, family separation to try to deter people from coming, and they still came."

The Biden administration continued to emphasize on the Sunday talk shows that the U.S.-Mexico border "remains closed" and that the majority of adults are being turned away. But Psaki said the administration was not going to force children to go back on a treacherous journey.

"They are fleeing challenging economic circumstances, hurricanes, prosecution in some scenarios," she said. "It does not mean that they get to stay in the United States. It means their cases are adjudicated and we want to treat them humanely, make sure they are in a safe place while their cases are adjudicated. That's what we're talking about here."

Former President Donald Trump expanded and fortified border walls while championing "zero tolerance" policies that made it more difficult to seek U.S. asylum and led to some immigrant parents being separated from their children.

Under federal law, children arriving at the border without parents should be transferred within three days from U.S. Border Patrol custody to long-term facilities run by the U.S. Health and Human Services until they can be released to family members or sponsors.

Psaki said the administration is committed to transparency and providing access to those temporary Border Patrol facilities as soon as it can.

"We are mindful of the fact that we are in the middle of a pandemic. We want to keep these kids safe, keep the staff safe," Psaki said.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, called on the president to let the media accompany him to a temporary detention facility in Dallas on Monday.

"I again urge you to stop denying reality, confront the consequences of your policies, and allow the media access to these facilities," Cruz wrote in a letter.

Psaki and Graham spoke on "Fox News Sunday," while Bedingfield was interviewed on ABC's "This Week."

SAN DIEGO, Calif. — As the U.S. grapples with a surge in drug overdoses linked to synthetic opioids, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has launched an initiative to disrupt the fentanyl supply chain.

“Never before in the past have we said, 'taking this drug will not hurt you. It will kill you.' In 2021, that’s where we are," said John Callery, Special Agent in Charge of the DEA San Diego Field Division. "Hence, 'Wave Breaker' – we have to get people educated. We have to get our local partners on board, and our federal partners, to understand exactly where we are.”

Callery has spent the last 29 years decoding the ever-changing playbooks of drug cartels.

“It doesn’t change every decade; it changes every two or three years," said Callery. "The only difference is the drugs on the streets of the United States right now are, by far, the deadliest they’ve ever been.”

From San Diego to New York, agents in 11 cities are working closely together, synthesizing enforcement efforts targeting the Sinaloa Cartel. Divisions participating in Project Wave Breaker are credited with 85% of all synthetic opioids seized by the DEA in 2020.

“Sinaloa, think of Chapo, Chapo Guzmán and his kids, Mayo Zambada. That’s Sinaloa Cartel. They have kind of garnered the market on fentanyl, as we speak, but you’ll certainly see that change in the next year to three years.”

Project Wave Breaker will direct interdiction, enforcement, and outreach efforts to the San Diego Field Division.

“You can call it OxyContin, Norco. You can call it whatever you want. At the end of the day, it’s heroin," said Special Agent Callery.

Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is approximately 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine. Callery says the surge in demand for prescription opioids fueled the deadly flow of fentanyl into the U.S.

“If you dose it right, it’s a fantastic heroin high. But If you’re off by a microgram, you’re going to die."

He says 70 to 80 percent of all fentanyl in the U.S. first crosses the southern California border.

“The cartels responded to that demand, for sure," said Ev Meade, a professor of practice at the Kroc School of Peace Studies at the University of San Diego.

A historian of Mexico, Meade is documenting the violence in places like Sinaloa.

“This fentanyl stuff is lethal. It's a public health emergency in both countries," said Meade. “But it’s also not like this was something that the Mexican cartels dreamed up and wanted to sell to the United States."

He says pharmaceutical companies laid the groundwork for the crisis, years before most Americans knew what fentanyl was.

"Who’s responsible? I think we all know who’s responsible when we think about it with the right hat on. It's the drug companies and U.S. physicians who created the opioid crisis; over-prescription and over-sale of these drugs," said Meade.

And Meade says much of the fentanyl supply has been imported into Mexico from countries like China.

"Mexico is a transit country, and the Mexican cartels are really good at that. They have, obviously, a lot of experience. They have diverse supply chains," said Meade.

But Special Agent Callery says the landscape is shifting.

“They [China] closed many, many of those fentanyl labs. Unfortunately, it’s still ongoing illicitly. But the scary part is something we predicted three, four years ago," said Callery. "Once that supply chain gets blocked, or it stops, the cartels are not going to stop. They’ve started creating their own fentanyl labs in Mexico. They've started creating their own chemicals required for fentanyl in Mexico. So sooner or later, they won't need that connection to Asia anymore. They'll be able to produce on their own."

Wave Breaker divisions are also expanding outreach to the community.

"It's not just focusing on, 'let’s seize OxyContin, let's seize fentanyl.' It's getting the communities involved. It's educating communities. DEA's, now that COVID is lifting a little bit, we're able to get back out to schools, we're able to get back out to medical schools, to pharmacists, to conventions, and talk to people about what's been going on in the last year-and-a-half when everything's kind of been on hold," said Callery.

“You can’t do a law enforcement approach without a public health approach – they’ve got to go hand-in-hand," said Meade. “You know, DARE is a stupid program, frankly. It never showed good results. But we need DARE for fentanyl. We need public information that says, you could use this once and die."

While the pandemic strained cartel operations in early 2020, Callery says they were able to adapt within months.

He says their division has discovered several tunnels since January 2020, but there's likely more they aren't aware of.

"It's that cat and mouse game that we’ve been playing since the 50s in the narcotics war."

But Callery says the DEA is also adjusting its playbook.

“We are putting people in jail who’ve provided fentanyl to addicts, and we’re charging them with homicide because they knew they were giving them a drug that was very deadly," said Callery.

Created in 2018, the Narcotics Task Force Team 10 is a multi-agency team housed by DEA to address drug overdose deaths in San Diego. Agencies on Team 10 include DEA, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Department of Homeland Security, California Department of Healthcare Services, and San Diego Police Department.

"That's non-traditional. That's not something DEA has done in the past," said Callery. "It’s something we’re doing here because the community needs it."