Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a Republican, has created an immense logjam at his state’s border with Mexico that has snarled supply chains, imperils the import of rapidly expiring produce, and risks exacerbating inflation.
Last week, Abbott announced that all commercial vehicles traveling to his state from Mexico would require secondary inspections to root out drug smuggling and human trafficking. He said the new policy was precipitated by the Biden administration’s plan to discontinue Title 42 at the end of May, which is a pandemic-era emergency health order that empowers federal officials to turn away migrants without giving them a chance to apply for asylum.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection called the secondary inspections “unnecessary.”
Since Abbott’s policy went into effect, truckers have reported waiting in traffic for upwards of 30 hours, according to The Washington Post.
“Produce that was destined to United States consumers in some cases will have to be destroyed because of the perishability of our products,” said Robert Guenther, International Fresh Produce Association’s chief policy officer, to The Post. “This will result in millions of lost economic production not only in Mexico but to the state of Texas and potentially other border states that are now experiencing similar delays.”
The delays are heightened by a protest of Abbott’s policy in the Rio Grande Valley. Truckers are completely blocking traffic there headed for the Pharr-Reynosa International Bridge.
The Texas Tribune reports:
Normally, 3,000 commercial trucks cross the Pharr bridge each day, hauling about $60 million to $70 million worth of daily goods and services through the busiest land crossing for produce entering the U.S. from Mexico.
The Tribune adds:
…six days into the new Texas initiative, it’s unclear how thoroughly the [Texas Department of Public Safety] is inspecting commercial vehicles — and whether state troopers are even opening up trucks’ cargo areas to look inside. It is also unclear whether the DPS has seized any drugs or encountered any undocumented migrants through the new program. The agency did not respond to requests for comment for this story.
The Post provides additional perspective:
The delays have raised concerns that a U.S. economy already experiencing inflation and supply shortages could face an entirely new set of problems, potentially driving up prices on certain products and making other items even more scarce.
White House officials blasted Abbott’s tactics, and multiple federal agencies were swept up in the fast-developing traffic jam.
“These actions are impacting people’s jobs and the livelihoods of hard-working families in Texas and across the country,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said. “It’s not a political statement. That’s a statement of fact. I’d also note that what we’re seeing with these unnecessary inspections of trucks, transport, transiting ports of entry between Texas and Mexico are significant delays, which are resulting in a drop in commercial traffic of up to 60 to 70 percent in some ports.”
On Wednesday, Abbott said he’d ease up inspections on trucks coming from Nuevo León, Mexico because the regional governor agreed to increased security measures.
“Clogged bridges can end only through the type of collaboration that we are demonstrating today between Texas and Nuevo León,” Abbott said at a news conference.
The Post provides more details on the traffic pile-up at the border:
The line for trucks to cross at the Pharr bridge has been reported at up to seven or eight miles long, said Rod Sbragia, vice chair of the Fresh Produce Association of the Americas and director of sales and marketing for Tricar Sales, a grower and shipper of Mexican produce. He said between 2,000 and 3,000 trucks stand nose to tail waiting for entry. Refrigerated trucks, he said, have about six or seven days of fuel to run their refrigeration units. After that, spoilage is certain.
The Post adds:
The miles of trucks had a range of products in their trailers, with items sitting idly in refrigerated chambers as temperatures outside breached 100 degrees. These included strawberries, asparagus, avocados, tomatoes among other things. Shippers scrambled to reroute and grocers hustled to find products from elsewhere to avoid empty shelves in the run-up to the Easter and Passover holidays.
The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency issued its own statement, saying the commercial wait time at the Pharr port of entry had grown from 63 minutes to 320 minutes, with a 35 percent drop in traffic.
The secondary inspections disrupting the trucking industry aren’t the only moves Abbott launched to protest the end of Title 42. He’s also sent busloads of migrants to Washington, D.C., where they conveniently unloaded in front of Fox News.
“By busing migrants to Washington, D.C., the Biden Administration will be able to more immediately meet the needs of the people they are allowing to cross our border,” Abbott said in a Wednesday morning statement. “Texas should not have to bear the burden of the Biden Administration’s failure to secure our border.”
