extradition to the u.s. the rally in iowa has been canceled due to weather bridport governor desantis is in the early presidential caucus state today. first let s go to bill melugin live at the border in brownsville, texas. bill, what is the latest there? brian coming in brownsville for the many cities that declared a state of emergency. brownsville sink thousands of illegal crossings every day this week. massive numbers and as a result of that border patrol i did mass releases. take look this video which are right here in brownsville. large group of migrants mass release walking on the bus terminal here ngo they get assistance with her travel documents. large majority are venezuelan right we caught up with one who said his release in the morning.
other cities and states across the country. i would say a number of things. number one, we re grateful to leader schumer and congress for the emergency food and shelter program funding in the omnibus this past december of $800 million. that s a significant increase over the prior year s funding of $150 million. we re working very closely with cities and communities along the border and in the interior of the united states. we need the system fixed. thank you. thank you, mr. secretary. back to the question of mass releases. i know you pushed back against that, but the florida attorney general has filed a lawsuit against you, alleging that you are about to conduct a policy of mass releases that is newspapers are released yesterday. what s your response to that and more broadly, what s your message to the judicial branch who is playing a role in this process? well, i don t send messages to the judicial branch. the judges make the decisions that they believe are warranted
that you prepared for this moment for almost two years. so why is part of that plan an honor system? it s not an honor system. this is a tool that has been used in the past. the vast majority of individuals will indeed be placed in expedited removal. are you on shaky legal ground with mass releases? first of all, your question has a factual predicate with which i would disagree about mass releases, number 1. we implement our operations in conjunction with the department of justice and we have confidence in the lawfulness of our actions. the administration argues this policy will be used on a case by case basis. in 2021 and 22, they released people during peak times. they said sector chiefs can use this process if 7,000 people come up per day over 72 hours.
enforcement proceedings, they are a subject of our apprehension efforts. you said it would be a fraction of migrants this happens with. how many is a fraction when you ve had almost 6 million illegal crossings under this administration? we last year removed, returned and expelled approximately 1.4 million individuals. that is the most in any one year. will you be on shaky legal ground, though, with mass releases? well, first of all on a case-by-case basis. first of all, your question has a factual predicate with which i would disagree, about mass releases, number one. but releases of individuals subject to an immigration enforcement proceedings is not something particular to this administration. basis and this would not be on a case-by-case basis. we we implement our operations in conjunction with
crossing in to el paso last night. local media reporting it was potentially up to 2,000 people and that it was possibly the biggest mass crossing in the city s history. as you look at the video, you ll see wave after wave of these people walking across the river and gathering on the u.s. side of the river where they form a single file line. that line stretches as far as the eye can see. well over 1,000 people crossed there. it was cold there last night. so you ll see many of them started setting camp fires in an effort to keep warm. cbp sources tell fox news that over the last 24 hours in that sector, there s been more than 2,400 illegal crossings. border patrol has 5,000 migrants in custody. they re over welled and over capacity. they have started mass releases. they re dropping hundreds off at a time in el paso city streets. the question where did they come