US military ordering thousands more troops to southern border

Thousands of additional active duty US troops are being ordered to the southern US border with Mexico, just two days after President Donald Trump mandated that the US military step up its presence there, according to officials familiar with the matter.

There are already roughly 2,200 active duty forces at the border as part of Joint Task Force-North, US Northern Command’s border mission based out of El Paso, Texas. They help support US Customs and Border Protection’s work there, performing mostly logistical and bureaucratic tasks like data entry, detection and monitoring, and vehicle maintenance.

It is not yet clear which specific units are being ordered to the border, but an initial wave will include around 1,500 troops.
The Trump administration asked the military earlier this week to be prepared to deploy up to 10,000 active duty troops immediately, setting off a scramble inside the Pentagon, one of the officials and another person familiar with the matter told CNN. Military officials have pushed back on that because they believe that sending so many troops to the border at once could pull them away from other mission requirements elsewhere in the world and strain resources, the first official said.

Even more active duty troops are expected to be deployed to the border in the coming weeks and months, one of the officials said, with this first wave laying the groundwork for a larger military footprint.

US Transportation Command has also been instructed to prepare to use US military assets, including military aircraft, for migrant repatriation flights, the two sources told CNN.
The initial wave of 1,500 troops includes 500 Marines from Camp Pendleton and the 1st Marine Division in San Diego, according to another defense official. The Marines are expected to arrive at the border imminently and will be prepared for all contingency operations, acting as both a rapid response force and a long-term solution.

“We’ve been told to treat this like a national emergency because it’s been declared a national emergency,” the official said. “Don’t be surprised if you see Marines being dropped off by helicopters.”

The number of Marines deployed as part of the border mission could ultimately climb to 2,500, the official said.

There is also a National Guard contingent at the border called Operation Lonestar, headed by the Texas National Guard. There are roughly 4,500 National Guardsmen currently assigned to the mission, according to the Texas Military Department.

The additional active duty troops being sent to the border this week will be doing much of the same, the officials said, and are expected to feed into and augment Joint Task Force-North.

They will be helping to maintain operational readiness for Border Patrol, assisting in command-and-control centers, and providing more intelligence specialists to assess threats and migrant flows, according to sources familiar with the planning.

The troops are also expected to augment air assets and help with air operations.

It is not clear whether the troops will be armed. But none of the active duty troops are authorized to perform any kind of law enforcement role, like perform arrests or seize drugs, or engage with migrants other than to help transport them to and around different migrant facilities.