It was 102 degrees in San Antonio yesterday — and probably more than 130 degrees inside that oven of an abandoned truck there on the outskirts of the city. Inside it, at least 46 illegal immigrants spent their final terrifying moments before succumbing slowly and horrifically.
What might their final thoughts have been in that dark, stifling, unrefrigerated trailer? Did they think about their home? Their native land? Their family and friends? Did they wonder how on earth they could’ve fallen prey to these traffickers who abandoned them? How on earth such an awful thing could be happening here in America?
Sixteen people somehow survived that ghoulish scene; somehow managed to keep breathing and keep from cooking. Four of those 16 were children. Our thoughts and prayers are with them. As the Associated Press reports:
A city worker heard a cry for help from the truck on a lonely San Antonio back road shortly before 6 p.m. Monday and discovered the gruesome scene, Police Chief William McManus said. Hours later, body bags lay spread on the ground near the trailer and bodies remained inside as authorities responded to the calamity.
It’s among the deadliest of the tragedies that have claimed thousands of lives in recent decades as people attempt to cross the U.S. border from Mexico. Ten migrants died in 2017 after being trapped inside a truck parked at a Walmart in San Antonio. In 2003, the bodies of 19 migrants were found in a sweltering truck southeast of San Antonio.
Yes, “thousands of lives in recent decades.”
According to The Wall Street Journal, this single incident accounts for the highest number of fatalities ever recorded in the annals of human smuggling across our southern border.
“These deaths are on Biden,” tweeted Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who’s been fighting a noble but losing battle against our corrupt American president and his willfully complicit secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas. “They are a result of his deadly open border policies. They show the deadly consequences of his refusal to enforce the law.”
He’s right, of course. Were our southern border genuinely secure instead of porous, this never would’ve happened. This didn’t happen on Donald Trump’s watch, either, and it’s not a coincidence that it didn’t. Failure has become habitual with the Biden administration, just as success in securing our southern border had become habitual with the Trump administration.
Elections have consequences, even for non-Americans. And secure borders save lives.
Aboard Air Force One, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters that Joe Biden was “closely monitoring the absolutely horrific and heartbreaking reports.” We’ll bet he was. Has he even seen their names on a sheet of paper? Will he ever take a few minutes to learn their stories? Will Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats ever take a knee inside the Capitol building for these latest victims of their refusal to secure our southern border? Joe Biden’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has been leaderless for 14 months and counting, but we’re supposed to believe he’s “closely monitoring” this situation?
Jean-Pierre also said, “Our prayers are with those who tragically lost their lives, their loved ones, as well as those still fighting for their lives.” And this we find deeply ironic, because whenever we offer our thoughts and prayers to the victims and families of mass shootings or other calamities, Democrats tell us to take those thoughts and prayers and go to hell.
The identities of all the deceased are not yet known, but, as Roberto Velasco Álvarez, head of the North America department in Mexico’s Foreign Relations Department, said on Twitter, “22 are from Mexico, seven are from Guatemala and two are from Honduras.”
“Our condolences,” he tweeted. “All responsible will be brought to justice.”
That’s not true, of course. All responsible will not be brought to justice — not unless Joe Biden and Alejandro Mayorkas are impeached next year by a Republican Congress.
UPDATE: The death toll has now reached 50.
UPDATE: This border tragedy gives us something else to think about. The Democrats have long believed that a browner America will also be a bluer America, but this cynical scheme is failing miserably. Not only are the Democrats suffering at the polls due to their awful open-borders policies; they’re also being abandoned in droves by independent-minded Hispanic Americans who refuse to be stereotyped.