EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) — The first U.S. military flight to deport migrants from the United States to Guantanamo Bay was set to depart Tuesday, February 4, according to CNN. Per the report, the aircraft was carrying around 10 migrants with criminal records.
The Wall Street Journal is reporting the flight departed on Tuesday from Fort Bliss in Texas and is bound for Guantanamo Bay.
Using a flight tracker app, KTSM tracked a U.S. Air Force C-17 aircraft that departed from Biggs Army Airfield around 1 p.m. MT on Tuesday. That flight appears to be headed in the direction of Cuba at this time.
“I have just learned that a flight left from Biggs Army Airfield at Fort Bliss to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba,” U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-Texas, said. “As a reminder, the situation on the border does not merit the use of military resources. El Paso currently has capacity, apprehensions are down, and the use of Guantanamo Bay is predicted to cost hundreds of millions of dollars. These measure are nothing more than unnecessary and cruel political theater and a gross misuse of federal funds and military personnel.”
It is the first step in what is expected to be a surge in the number of migrants held at the Navy base in Cuba, which has primarily been used to detain individuals associated with the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.
President Donald Trump has eyed the facility as a holding center and said it has the capacity to hold as many as 30,000.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who visited Fort Bliss and the southern border on Monday, has called it a “perfect place” to house migrants. Additional U.S. troops have arrived at the facility in the past few days to help prepare it, according to multiple reports.
The U.S. has previously used Fort Bliss to send deportation flights to Guatemala and Ecuador, using the military’s C-17. In addition, Colombian officials flew to the U.S. and took two flights of migrants back to Colombia. One of those Colombian flights landed at and then took off from Fort Bliss, carrying migrants back to their home country.
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