Massive Drop in Illegal Border Crossings Leads Galveston County to Stop Sending Deputies
Galveston County, Texas –
Galveston County will stop sending Sheriff’s deputies and deputy constables to the southern border in April. Galveston County Judge Mark Henry said two deputies will continue helping the Kinney County Sheriff’s Office through the end of March.
Following an historic spike in the number of people caught illegally crossing the southern border, Henry signed a disaster declaration in July 2021 that allowed Galveston County to send resources to rural border counties through Gov. Greg Abbott’s Operation Lone Star.
Henry said he’ll cancel the disaster declaration in April.
“So we made the determination that if we can’t be helpful to Kinney County, that we will offer our services to the governor to help elsewhere with Operation Lone Star. But if not needed, then we will just wrap it up and bring them on back,” said Henry. “We really helped them out with their manpower being so small and the invasion being so large. So we’re glad to see that it’s finally under control and very happy to have our people back in Galveston County full time.”
Galveston County’s program was voluntary and used Operation Lone Star and American Rescue Plan funds to pay for the effort.
The resource sharing came from rural counties, like Kinney County, being overwhelmed by the number of immigrants illegally crossing the border and smuggling operations. Gov. Abbott asked larger counties to fill in the gaps in manpower.
Gov. Abbott also announced the state would be closing a jail booking facility in Jim Hogg County that was used to handle border-related arrests. The facility was opened in 2022 and Abbott said it will be closed by April. A second, similar facility in Val Verde County remains open.
Under President Joe Biden the number of people caught illegally crossing the border hit historic highs with annual totals topping more than 2 million arrests and monthly total arrests averaging between more than 100,000 and more than 200,000.
In February 2025, the first full month President Donald Trump was in office, the number of arrests along the southern border dropped below 9,000, compared to more than 140,000 in Feb. 2024.