An 8-year-old girl died Wednesday while she was being held by U.S. Border Patrol.
The girl was detained with her family at a Customs and Border Patrol facility in Harlingen, Texas, on the U.S. side of the Rio Grande about 20 miles northwest of Brownsville.
“The child and her family were in custody at the Harlingen Station where she experienced a medical emergency,” CBP said. “Emergency Medical Services were called to the station and transported her to the local hospital where she was pronounced dead.”
No details on the girl’s identity or nationality were immediately released.
CBP promised it would launch an internal investigation. The agency has violated several of its own rules recently as it struggles to deal with an influx of migrants.
At the start of the COVID pandemic, the federal government began turning away asylum seekers under a rule known as Title 42. That policy expired last week with the official end of the COVID emergency.
The rule change has led to an overwhelming amount of people in Border Patrol custody. On May 10, the day before Title 42 expired, the agency held nearly 30,000 people.
Border Patrol rules also say no one should be held for more than 72 hours. However, the average holding time on Sunday was 77 hours.ExpandAutoplay
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U.S. Border Patrol agents move through a crowd of migrants that have waited between two border walls for days to apply for asylum, as they decide who to take next to processing on May 12, 2023, in San Diego. Hundreds of migrants remain waiting between the two walls, many for days. (Gregory Bull/AP)
To combat the surge, the agency started releasing people without court dates — until a federal judge ruled that was illegal.
The 8-year-old girl was technically the first minor to die in Border Patrol custody since President Joe Biden took office in 2021. However, an unaccompanied 17-year-old boy from Honduras died at a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services facility last week, shortly after passing through Border Patrol.