Migrants pose for photos at border wall after crossing into US
Hundreds of migrants were seen posing for photos at a border wall in San Diego county moments after crossing into the US through a gap in the barrier. The asylum seekers were spotted entering the country through the hole near San Diego in the early hours of Tuesday.
The group was composed of migrants from Mauritania, Nepal, India , China , Vietnam and others according to Fox correspondent Bill Melugin who was at the scene. The migrants reported minimal resistance on their way and described breezing past the Mexican military.
It comes as the White House revealed President Biden is preparing to sign off an order to temporarily shut down the border once a daily threshold of crossings has been met. The video shows a handful of migrants posing up alongside the wall as if it were a 'tourist attraction' according to Melugin.
The clip has once again spotlighted the border crisis, which has become a flashpoint ahead of the election as crossings continue to surge. Biden has been under pressure to get a grip on the numbers , with polls showing a majority of Americans are dissatisfied with his handling of the situation.
The current number of crossings remains high, with 179,725 encounters recorded in April The executive order that would shut down asylum requests at the U.S.-Mexico border once the average number of daily encounters hits 2,500 between ports of entry.
The border would only reopen once that number declines to 1,500, according to several people familiar with the discussions. The 2,500 figure means that the executive order could go into immediate effect because daily figures are currently above this.
The president has been deliberating over how to act on the border after his bipartisan legislation to clamp down on crossings collapsed. Republicans defected from the deal at the urging of Donald Trump, the former president and presumptive Republican presidential nominee.
Biden has continued to consider executive action even though the number of illegal crossings at the southern border has declined for months, partly because of a stepped-up effort by Mexico . The order is aimed at trying to head off any potential spike in border encounters that could happen later this year, closer to the November elections.
Trump's campaign said in a statement that the order would not be effective and that if 'Biden truly wanted to shut down the border, he could do so with a swipe of the same pen .'
