Border Report Live

A nonprofit organization that stresses community involvement and peaceful border solutions is hosting a weekend tour of Eagle Pass, Texas, and the Rio Grande.
Amerika Garcia-Grewal, co-director of the Frontera Federation, said their Living River Convening event will give the public a chance to visit the South Texas border and view the river, as well as the Mexican border town of Piedras Negras.
According to the event’s signup registration website says, the event “will address the intersection of border militarization, migrant rights, and the severe ecological degradation caused by climate change in the Rio Grande basin.”

A new report by the Brookings Institution examines a paradox along the U.S.-Mexico border: the government is spending billions of dollars on border security infrastructure, yet thousands of unincorporated communities known as “colonias” lack basic services such as paved roads, drainage systems, safe drinking water, and access to essential services.
The report, titled “As Border Enforcement Expands, ‘Colonia’ Communities Are Left Without Basic Infrastructure,” was published on April 30 and focuses on border communities in the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas.
One of the authors of the report, Adrik Gonzalez, appeared on Border Report Live on Tuesday. He outlined how outdated data, gaps in state and federal oversight, and limited county authority have left thousands of families vulnerable to flooding, public health risks, and long-term economic neglect — and why he says updating federal definitions and empowering local governments is critical to fixing the problem.

A Texas DACA recipient who was arrested and deported by ICE before being allowed to return to the U.S. only to be rearrested upon re-entry, has been released from detention.
José Contreras Diaz, 30, of Edinburg, Texas, as released Wednesday from the Port Isabel Detention Center in the South Texas border town of Los Fresnos, where he had been held since April 29, the national immigration group FWD.us says.
“I would not wish what I’ve been through on anyone. They detained me, sent me to a country I barely remember, and then gave me hope — the hope that I could come home, see my family, and hold my son again. Then that hope was taken away,” Diaz said in a statement issued by FWD.us.
The arrest, detention and re-arrest of Diaz by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement adds to the growing number of arrests of DACA recipients, which is raising concern among the immigrant community.

The federal government has begun installing waterborne buoys in the Rio Grande in Laredo, Texas, City Councilwoman Melissa Cigarroa says.
Construction began Wednesday, Cigarroa said on Thursday’s episode Border Report Live.
She said the council has been told they cannot stop the installation of the giant orange buoys, which are meant to stop immigration from Mexico.
But she says they are working hard to slow it down and study the process of border wall barrier being put on the banks of the Rio Grande through downtown Laredo.

The director of a new documentary film about two migrant women who sought sanctuary from U.S. immigration authorities in two Colorado churches for years says that is no longer an option for migrants today.
In the latest episode of Border Report Live, Theo Rigby, director and producer of “If I Could Stay/Si Pudiera Quedarme” tells South Texas correspondent Sandra Sanchez and host Rudy Mireles about how he chronicled the two women over eight years starting 2017 through 2025.
They spent thousands of days living in the two different churches, which caused some strife for the congregations. Rigby says the film shows humanity through the lense of religion and highlights how these predominantly Anglo congregations helped these two women of color.
Ingrid, from Peru, struggled to keep a sense of normalcy for her young and growing family as they lived in the basement of a church.

Newly unsealed U.S. indictments accusing sitting Mexican politicians and senior law enforcement officials of drug trafficking and corruption are impacting Mexico’s political system.
On the latest episode of Border Report Live, host Rudy Mireles speaks with Ev Meade, director of Proceso Pacífico, about the unprecedented case involving a sitting governor, a senator, a city mayor and multiple high-ranking security officials accused of working with the Sinaloa cartel.
Meade breaks down how extradition requests between the United States and Mexico work, why Mexican authorities are reviewing evidence before acting, and what past cases show can happen when powerful figures are not extradited. He also explains why this indictment stands out for detailing specific acts of violence, including the killing of a confidential informant.
The discussion also explores political fallout for President Claudia Sheinbaum’s administration, arguments over sovereignty, and growing public frustration in Sinaloa, where residents have endured months of sustained violence and instability.

The proposed elimination of Temporary Protected Status for hundreds of thousands of immigrants would cause economic and societal hardships to the United States, a professor said on this episode of Border Report Live.
The U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday on why the Trump administration wants to revoke Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for hundreds of thousands of people from other countries who are allowed to legally live and work in the United States under the program.
If TPS is lifted it would affect an estimated 1.3 million people, including 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians. They would not be allowed to work and no longer protected from deportation.
They’d be “yanking complying people out of the things they’ve been legally doing,” University of Texas at El Paso anthropology professor Josiah Heyman told Border Report Live host Rudy Mireles and South Texas correspondent Sandra Sanchez.

The recent arrest of a cartel leader has sparked a rash of violence in the Mexican border state of Tamaulipas.
The capture of Alexander Benavides Flores, known as “El Metro 9,” a leader within the Gulf Cartel, has triggered armed confrontations and blockades in Reynosa and the surrounding area across the border from McAllen, Texas.
The violence prompted the State Department to issue travel warnings.
KVEO/CBS4 reporter Jorge Vela has been monitoring the violence south of the border and has been speaking with residents of Reynosa.