Gov. Kemp tours humanitarian crisis unfolding at US-Mexico border

MCALLEN, Texas — Channel 2 Action News is the only local station in Texas as Gov. Brian Kemp tours the U.S.-Mexico border as a humanitarian crisis continues to unfold.

Channel 2′s Justin Farmer traveled to McAllen, Texas with the governor, where more than 1 million apprehensions have occurred since February.

A surge of people have been trying to illegally get into the United States.

Only Channel 2 is with Gov. Kemp for his trip to the boarder. Stay with WSBTV.com and tune into WSB Tonight at 11 p.m. updates from Texas.

It’s been described by Republicans and Democrats as a humanitarian, health and security crisis.

Kemp and several other governors gathered to meet with border patrol agents on Wednesday.

The governor’s day started early, as he thanked members of Georgia’s National Guard.

While Kemp said he’s grateful for their work outside of Georgia, he doesn’t think the federal government is holding up its end.

“Troop levels have decreased by 1,000 on this mission and then they decreased by another 500, so there’s 1,500 less people now than when I was here before. But you have an influx of people coming, you’d think it would actually be the reverse of that,” Kemp said.

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Kemp is among several Republican governors such as Greg Abbott of Texas and Ohio’s Mike Dewine, who are calling on the Biden administration to add more full-time troops to the area.

More than 1 million people from Haiti, Nicaragua and other nations are languishing in squalor on the Mexican side of the border trying to get processed.

Along with all those people, Mexican cartels are also smuggling thousands of pounds of drugs, including fentanyl.

“We learned a lot of figures today. They’ve seized 8,800 pounds of drugs here,” Kemp said.

Georgia Democrats are critical of the governor’s trip, saying in a statement:

“Brian Kemp’s trip to the border is nothing more than a desperate political stunt. Instead of showing an ounce of leadership on the issues affecting Georgians like ending this pandemic and keeping our children healthy, Kemp only cares about scoring political points.”

As the situation continues to unfold at the border, the Department of Defense and U.S. troops are stretched thin.

On top of the situation at the border, troops are still involved in processing tens of thousands of Afghan refugees brought to the U.S. after the U.S.’s withdrawal from Afghanistan in August.

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Gov. Kemp, head of GA National Guard tour crisis at southern border Only Channel 2 Action News was there as Gov. Brian Kemp and the commanding general of the GA National Guard left Friday morning for the Texas-Mexico border.

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