The mayor of Del Rio, Texas, has closed the international U.S.–Mexico bridge after thousands of illegal immigrants arrived in the area and set up camps underneath and around the bridge.
Del Rio Mayor Bruno Lozano, a Democrat, declared a local state of disaster and said his city is closing toll booths on the international bridge to the Mexican city of Ciudad Acuna to halt traffic, while adding that he has requested state assistance to deal with the burgeoning crisis. City officials, he said, are expecting about 8,000 more illegal aliens to arrive in the area in the coming days.
“Dire circumstances require dire responses,” Lozano said during a news conference, saying that such measures are done as a security precaution.
“There’s people having babies down there [under the bridge], there’s people collapsing out of the heat,” the mayor said. “They’re pretty aggressive, rightly so—they’ve been in the heat day after day after day.”