TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Florida Highway Patrol troopers, accompanied by Texas law enforcement officers, helped locate and detain more than 1,600 undocumented immigrants near the U.S.-Mexico border between mid-February and mid-August while assisting with the arrests of alleged human traffickers, drug smugglers and gang members, agency records obtained by News 6 show.
FHP troopers deployed to Texas also took part in other law enforcement actions potentially unrelated to immigration such as trying to locate a teen wanted on a child pornography warrant and raiding casinos tied to a federal money laundering probe, internal agency documents reveal for the very first time.
Daily “activity logs” prepared by FHP supervisors indicate there were “no significant events to report” or no notable activity on at least 20% of the days during that six-month period. The agency has not explained why.
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Details about the troopers‘ day-to-day activities in Texas had never been disclosed by FHP officials until News 6 requested and obtained public records from the agency.
FHP has spent millions of Florida taxpayer dollars sending troopers to the Mexico border to help Texas authorities combat illegal immigration, News 6 previously reported.
About 48 additional troopers could have been hired and provided with new vehicles for the same cost FHP spent on the border assignment between July 2023 and April 2024, state budget records indicate.
FHP officials previously said 76 Florida troopers were simultaneously deployed to Texas border towns in February. The agency has not responded to questions inquiring whether that staffing level has changed since last winter.
State personnel from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, and the Florida State Guard have also been deployed to Texas as part of Operation Lone Star, a program launched by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in 2021 to address a sharp increase in illegal border crossings that he attributed to President Joe Biden’s immigration policies.
“This is part of a yearslong effort for us to help do what the federal government has refused to do, which is to actually defend this country’s borders,” Gov. Ron DeSantis said in February as he bid farewell to dozens of FHP troopers headed to Texas.
A News 6 crew travelled to Eagle Pass in mid-February to observe FHP troopers working along the Mexico border.
At the time, FHP officials would not discuss specific information about the troopers’ activities in Texas.
“FHP is not refusing to provide details to you; however, this is a very sensitive and dangerous environment with involvement of the Mexican drug cartels,” FHP spokesperson Molly Best said in February. “I cannot go into the details of specific day-to-day activities as this is an ongoing operation.”
News 6 submitted a public record request in late February seeking copies of daily activity logs prepared by FHP supervisors in Texas.
Eight months later, the agency provided News 6 with logs detailing notable activities performed by Florida troopers working along the Mexico border over a nearly 180-day period.
FHP representatives did not respond to four emails sent by News 6 earlier this month inquiring whether the agency had good faith concerns that trooper safety could be compromised by the publication of those daily activity logs.
It remains unclear what notable activity may have occurred when the News 6 crew visited Eagle Pass on Feb. 15 because the electronic PDF document containing the activity log for that particular day was “corrupted,” according to an FHP record custodian.
But activity logs from other days reveal that FHP troopers, accompanied by troopers with the Texas Department of Public Safety, assisted in locating, detaining and transporting more than 1,600 undocumented aliens, or UDAs, over a 6-month period.
- An FHP trooper and a Texas DPS trooper encountered an undocumented female and child who used wire cutters to breach the wire fence surrounding Shelby Park in Eagle Pass on Feb. 14.
- On Feb. 16, an FHP trooper and Texas trooper arrested a driver for human smuggling and transported four UDAs to U.S. Border Patrol after conducting a traffic stop.
- Two FHP troopers at a stationary post in the Rio Grande Valley assisted with the detention of about 50 UDAs from Venezuela on March 5. Later that day, an FHP trooper and a Texas trooper in the Del Rio area assisted the National Guard by handing 34 UDAs over to Border Patrol.
- The following day, a Texas trooper accompanied by an FHP trooper pursued a vehicle that fled from a traffic stop and later crashed. Three UDAs died after being ejected from the vehicle. The driver and passenger were arrested for fleeing and human smuggling.
- An FHP trooper and Texas trooper assisted the National Guard on March 9 with the apprehension of two UDAs walking along an Eagle Pass highway “headed to NY and Miami.”
- Three large bags containing 75 pounds of marijuana were seized during a traffic stop on March 15 from a car transporting four UDAs.
- An FHP trooper assisted Border Patrol with detaining 65 UDAs who had crossed the Rio Grande River on March 19.
- An FHP trooper and his assigned Texas trooper assisted Border Patrol and the National Guard on May 8 with locating 90 UDAs on a ranch property near Del Rio.
- UDAs from Cuba, Venezuela, Mexico and Haiti, including three pregnant women and several juveniles, were intercepted by an FHP trooper and Texas trooper on July 17 and turned over to Border Patrol.
- On July 31, an FHP trooper and a Texas trooper found two guns, cocaine and marijuana in a car driven by a UDA from Mexico.
- An undocumented migrant carrying a large bundle of marijuana was apprehended by Texas and Florida troopers on Aug. 6 after he successfully scaled the U.S.-Mexico border wall in the Rio Grande Valley.
FHP troopers operating Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, or UAVs, conducted more than 470 flights between mid-February and mid-August, activity logs show, which helped identify at least 411 undocumented migrants. No migrants were seen during 9% of those drone flights.
In a February press release, Florida officials indicated FHP troopers had “contacted” nearly 150,000 undocumented aliens since the state began participating in Operation Lone Star in 2021. Public records requested by News 6 do not include the period prior to mid-February, so that statistic could not be independently confirmed.
Although Gov. DeSantis sent personnel from the Florida Highway Patrol and other state agencies to Texas as part of an operation to address the illegal immigration crisis, records show FHP troopers occasionally performed other law enforcement work potentially unrelated to that mission.
- An FHP trooper and his assigned Texas trooper assisted the Port Isabel Police Department as that agency investigated a message written on a high school bathroom wall threatening a shooting.
- An FHP trooper assisted the U.S. Marshals Service and Texas DPS in an unsuccessful attempt to serve an arrest warrant on an 18-year-old man for child pornography in May.
- An FHP trooper responded to Eagle Pass ISD high school during a lockdown prompted by the sighting of a toy Airsoft gun.
- An FHP trooper took part in a “sting” at two casinos in Lyford where warrants were served to remove all machines, tables, cash registers, phones and money. Federal authorities said the raid on the game rooms was part of a money laundering investigation.
- An FHP trooper joined another agency at a Sullivan City gas station where a woman attempted to ignite herself on fire in August.
- FHP troopers also assisted Texas authorities with traffic stops, drunken-driving arrests, crash investigations and commercial vehicle inspections.
FHP troopers provided security to dignitaries visiting the border, records show, including President Joe Biden’s trip to Brownsville on Feb. 29.
When Florida Chief Financial Officer Jimmy Patronis visited Eagle Pass on April 2, FHP troopers provided “greetings, security, and transportation.” FHP personnel took part in no other notable activities in the Del Rio and Eagle Pass area that day or the following two days, according to the activity log.
“Florida is a force-multiplier,” Patronis said in a statement after his trip to the border. “At every engagement with an illegal immigrant, they’re putting their lives at risk, but as one official told me, it’s better when two patrol cars respond to a dangerous event, than one.”
While records indicate FHP troopers deployed to Texas have had a significant number of encounters with undocumented migrants along the Mexico border, there were many days when FHP reported no notable activity in the daily logs.
On at least 37 days between February and August, FHP supervisors wrote in the daily activity logs that there were “no significant events to report” or “nothing to report.”
That figure does not include so-called “changeover” days that occurred every two weeks when troopers completing their deployment began driving back to Florida as a new wave of troopers arrived in Texas.
FHP representatives did not respond to questions from News 6 inquiring about the 20% of log entries documented as having no notable activity, so it is unclear whether troopers truly experienced days without significant action or if FHP supervisors simply failed to document the troopers’ work.
During “Wave 29,″ which spanned from June 12 through June 26, an FHP captain signed off on logs stating that there was “nothing to report” on at least ten consecutive days. Activity reports for two additional days during that wave were not provided to News 6.
An FHP spokesperson did not respond to questions about the lack of documented activity during Wave 29. Sources told News 6 that troopers were working in Texas on those days, but the agency would not confirm that information.
The agency also did not indicate whether there are any plans to scale back or withdraw Florida troopers from the Mexico border as President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take office in January.
Trump has vowed to improve border security and deport migrants who are in the U.S. illegally.
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