Texas Gov. Abbott: COVID, Water Issues Reported at Youth Migrant Facilities

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, calling the situation at the Mexico border a "humanitarian disaster," announced that serious conditions, including several young migrants testing positive for COVID-19, have been discovered at two holding facilities housing children who have crossed the border.

The Republican governor told Fox News' "America Reports" Friday afternoon that about an hour before his interview, he learned that health officials have determined that in each of the facilities located in Carrizo Springs, located in south Texas, and in Midland, 10% of the migrants have tested positive for COVID-19.

In addition, in the Midland location, there is "no proven clean and running water," said Abbott. "They were using well water that a Texas commission on environmental quality has informed the federal government has not been proven to be safe. There's no telling what could be in there, including the possibility of arsenic."

"Any time we are dealing with a massive amount of influx, and that would be a humanitarian crisis with a big challenge," Abbott said. "Now knowing the magnitude, and this is during the course of a pandemic, it is endangering life as we speak."

Abbott said Texas state agencies have been in contact with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and with the Federal Emergency Management Agency and working with them to respond to the water emergency.

"The Biden administration is showing they were completely unprepared for this massive influx (of immigrants)," said Abbott.

The federal government is also transferring teenage migrants to the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center in Dallas because of the overcrowded conditions at the border, and Abbott said that poses another challenge for the disaster caused by the Biden administration.

"Open border policies will always be a disaster," said Abbott, noting there are workers in the facilities that will go back into their communities and could also test positive for COVID.

"The Biden administration needs to tell all of us where these kids are from," said Abbott. "There are so many questions that the Biden administration is simply not answering."

Midland Mayor Patrick Payton, also appearing on the show, said city leaders were not contacted before the federal government started shipping young migrants into the holding facility in his city, and already, children are being relocated to other locations from the center.

"It is utter chaos," said Payton, a Republican. "You can't get details and the facility is up and running. They are putting a 10-foot fence around it even as we speak ... they give us very scant answers to the questions I ask."

He added that city officials are "very deeply concerned about what's happening and what's happening to these kids, but also deeply concerned about the overreach and abuse by the federal government."

Payton said in his community and in Odessa combined, officials are also concerned about what has happened to the migrant children, many of whom he alleged have been abused.

"We are being told by the government, 'We don't need their help,'" said Payton. "It's another one of those issues where we can't even help with a crisis that's unfolding within our borders. ... We are just scrambling as we are watching this crisis start migrating into Texas and the country."

He said if he could have the ears of Biden and his administration, he would tell them that the harm they are "unleashing" because of the "symbolism they believe about immigration is translating to a crisis."

"Families are being abused, children are being abused, and the administration's policies make no sense," said Payton. "But we have to live with that and the rest of the country has to live with that as well."

Earlier on Friday, Abbott told Fox News' "America's Newsroom" the coronavirus is being imported into the United States by allowing people to enter the country because the border has not been secured. Also, he complained that professionals in Texas are not being allowed to have access to minors coming into the country to ask them about their experiences when it comes to human trafficking.

"I made a direct plea to the Biden administration a couple of days ago for Texas and our professionals in this state that deal with human trafficking all the time to have access to these minors who have come across the border to learn more about how they were trafficked here," the Republican governor said. "We received word yesterday from the Biden administration that they would allow no such thing because they want to continue the cover-up."