El Paso County Commissioners approve resolution to address migrant death crisis

UPDATE: El Paso County Commissioners unanimously approved a resolution Monday acknowledging the growing crisis of migrant deaths in the El Paso Border Patrol Sector. The resolution was brought forward by Commissioner David Stout and it aims to address the issue by improving data collection and collaboration with local and national organizations.  

“Sounds like the rest of the court is pretty much in line with what I've been working on,” said Stout during the discussion. He says he is working with the County Chief Administrator and Chief Medical Examiner to provide more accurate and transparent information. 

County Commissioner Jackie Butler also said this is a call to action, “I think as policymakers it's a lot easier to move forward when we know that there's a collective effort, especially when there are policy experts and researchers behind it lending their support,” she said. “It's almost an obligation that we have to respond to these kinds of crises and to call attention and awareness to them. For a long time, it didn't impact us directly here, but now it is.”

County Judge Ricardo Samaniego agreed to make this a priority for the county, “We need more unity,” he said. “So, we'll encourage, ourselves included, that we need to do more. I think we think we do more, but I think there's a lot more that we can do.”

Multiple people signed up for public comment on the resolution, urging the county for action. Advocates emphasized the importance of tracking migrant deaths to understand and prevent them. 

Chilton Tippin, Ph.D. student in cultural anthropology and El Paso native, said he struggled to access critical information about migrant deaths when conducting research over the summer in El Paso.  

“The rising incidence of migrant deaths is actually a preventable public health trend, and it really should be treated as such,” Tippin said. “Failing to properly account for these deaths is tantamount to erasing them, because without such data, it's as if this crisis isn't happening at all.”

Juan Ortiz, an El Paso native and member of La Cruz Rosa, urged policymakers to implement lifesaving measures, “We can go out there and deal with the consequences at the federal, state and local level for an action,” he said. “But it's going to take the structural, part sectors of this country to bring forth alleviation because all we're doing is responding to these manmade crisis.”

Juan Paul Flores Vasquez, an El Paso native and DACA recipient, emphasized the need for humanity and action, “People shouldn't be dying just because they couldn't access some water or some warm clothes,” he said. “If these if this data can help that, it would be very much appreciated.”

EL PASO, TX (KVIA) — Advocates from the Hope Border Institute are urging local county leaders to take action as the El Paso Border Patrol Sector became the deadliest along the border in 2024. The organization will address El Paso County Commissioners for the first time today, during the Commissioners Court meeting.

A new report shows the sector reported 196 fatalities in 2024, a rise from 143 in 2023. 

ABC-7 spoke with Aimée Santillán, policy analyst for the Hope Border Institute, who explained most of the deaths are due to dehydration and heat exposure in the outskirts of El Paso County and areas like the Mount Cristo Rey desert and Santa Teresa desert. 

Santillán says migrant deaths have been happening since the beginning of the prevention through deterrence that was introduced the 1990's, but the rise locally started after President Biden passed the asylum proclamation in June of last year. “2023 was the first year that the number of deaths surpassed 100 with 143 deaths for the fiscal year,” she said.

Santillán says the most concerning part of the issue is the lack of concrete data regarding migrant deaths, “the county’s office of the medical examiner hasn't implemented a system to really analyze that data and differentiate between resident deaths and migrant deaths,” Santillán said.

The Hope Border Institute is calling on commissioners to improve data tracking to help non-governmental organizations (NGOs) address the crisis. 

After speaking with Border Patrol and first responders for the organization’s report, Making Migrant Death Data Count, Santillán says their research revealed Border Patrol is understaffed and search-and-rescue missions are underfunded. “Sometimes they'll encounter someone while they're patrolling, but they don't have the medical resources or personnel that can quickly attend to the person,” Santillán said.

“We're very excited that the Commissioners Court is acknowledging this issue as a crisis for the first time,” Santillán said. “We need to really understand the data to know what other options we have, to really respond to what's going on.” 

The Commissioners Court meeting will start at 9:30 a.m. at the Enrique Moreno County Courthouse. 

Stay with ABC-7 for the latest developments.