As part of President Trump’s effort to close the US-Mexico border, the Trump administration authorized the deployment of 1,115 more service members to the southern border on Thursday.
With the most recent deployments, there will be nearly 10,000 US troops at the border, which is significantly more than the 2,500 National Guard members that former President Joe Biden had stationed there at the end of his administration.
According to a US Northern Command spokesperson, over 8,000 service members are currently actively patrolling the US-Mexico border in land support, maritime, and aerial capacities.
According to a statement from US Northern Command, the incoming units will offer “enhanced sustainment, engineering, medical, and operational capabilities as part of the Department of Defense’s continued whole-of-government approach to gain full operational control of the southern border.”
Members of the Army’s Expeditionary Sustainment Command, who will oversee logistics, and the Quartermaster Field Feeding Company, who will make sure soldiers eat enough in the hostile conditions, are approved components for deployment.
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Approximately 50% of the 1,115 soldiers scheduled for deployment are assigned to brigades, battalions, and engineering companies and will be tasked with construction-related tasks.
Early Thursday morning, the House of Representatives passed Trump’s “big, beautiful” agenda bill, which allocates $175 billion for border security, including $46.5 billion for the construction of new border walls.
The Senate still has to approve the legislation.
Since Trump took office in January, the number of illegal border crossings from Mexico has fallen to all-time lows.
According to Border Patrol statistics, federal agents encountered less than 10,000 migrants illegally crossing the southern border last month, a 93% decrease from the more than 128,000 individuals who poured across in April of last year under the Biden administration.
The US military was instructed by Trump’s Day One executive order on border security to “defend the sovereignty and territorial integrity” of the US by thwarting attempts by drug smugglers, human traffickers, and illegal migrants to enter the nation between ports of entry.
In addition to deploying additional troops, Trump has given the military permission to seize vast tracts of federal land along the southern border to carry out the mission.
