Smugglers used “cloned” FedEx vehicles in an attempt to bring 26 illegal migrants into El Paso, Texas, US Customs and Border Protection officials said.
The Border Patrol’s Santa Teresa Station Anti-Smuggling Unit received a tip about the plan, with agents and state troopers stopping vehicles, two of which were outfitted to look exactly like typical white FedEx vans.
Officials arrested four smugglers involved in the scheme, as well as apprehending the 26 migrants, who were from Mexico and Guatemala, on June 8.
Border Patrol sources told The Post there is a FedEx facility very close to the border in Santa Teresa, New Mexico — which is part of the El Paso sector and a known pick up area for smugglers and migrants.
“We joked that they [smugglers] were either going to pay a FedEx driver to smuggle migrants or that they were going to clone a truck,” one agent said.
Border Patrol agent Sean Coffey said the tactic isn’t new, but hasn’t been used in recent years.
“We haven’t seen a FedEx vehicle in some time,” he told KTSM. “We do see other types of vehicles used, like construction vehicles, vehicles that they put a sticker on [so] that [it] looks like a company vehicle.”
Coffey condemned the smuggling scheme as a great danger to the lives of the migrants, following recent tragedies where dozens of people have died in the back of poorly ventilated trucks trying to sneak past the border.
“The insides of some of these vehicles can become extremely hot, especially with the large amount of people that are trying to put inside of them,” he said.
Last week, officials rescued 35 migrants from a trailer in Anthony, New Mexico, and last year saw 53 die inside a truck after they were abandoned by smugglers in San Antonio, Texas.
Coffey added the renewed FedEx tactic is likely a result of emboldened smugglers looking to provide migrants with a solution to entering the US, after the end of Title 42.
It comes as the Post has reported cartel-linked smugglers have started create and market their services via well-produced YouTube and Tik Tok videos boasting of their prowess at getting people over the border undetected.
It appears they are succeeding too, as in May Us Border Patrol admitted 530,000 ‘gotaways’ — illegal immigrants known to have entered the country but not been caught — have been recorded since last October.
On June 12, border chief Raoul Ortiz posted an estimated 2,493 gotaways had made their way into the country in the previous three days.
The number of people attempting to enter the country illegally has increased since May 11, when the administration made it harder for migrants to be officially admitted to the US following the end of the pandemic-era Title 42 measure.
