Recently released video footage shows an unaccompanied toddler crossing into the United States to join his parents, who are already in the country, as concerns about illegal immigration continue to loom large on the minds of Americans.

Lt. Chris Olivarez of the Texas Department of Public Safety shared video film on X-Sunday documenting an encounter employees of his agency had with a 2-year-old girl they met in the border county of Maverick County. Olivarez summarized the interaction between police officers and the girl, who communicated in Spanish, in a caption accompanying the video.

“An unaccompanied 2-year-old child from El Salvador explains that she arrived in the United States by herself and that her parents are in the United States. The child had a piece of paper with a phone number and name,” he explained. “This is a clear example of the precarious journey these children make from their home country and how criminal organizations traffic these children across the southern border and further into the interior.”

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Olivarez added: “Regardless of political views, it is unacceptable for any child to be exposed to dangerous criminal trafficking networks. With a record number of unaccompanied children and hundreds of thousands missing, no one ensures the safety and security of these children except the men and women, who are on the front line every day. Despite the criticism over the years, the reality is that many children are exploited and trafficked, never to be heard from again.”

He further lamented that the young Salvadoran child is just one of 60 unaccompanied children between the ages of 2 and 17 that his team encountered among this particular group of 211 illegal immigrants in Maverick County on Sunday morning.

Concerns about the prevalence of illegal immigrants in the United States played a role in the 2024 presidential election, as President-elect Donald Trump made border security a key issue of his campaign.

Exit polling showed that 53% of voters trusted Trump, the Republican presidential candidate, to handle the issue of illegal immigration better than his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, while 44% said the opposite. Among the 12% of voters who cited illegal immigration as the most important problem facing the country, 89% supported Trump compared to 9% who supported Harris.

The focus on illegal immigration resonated particularly well in Texas, one of four states that share a border with Mexico. Trump also carried Maverick County by a margin of almost 20 percentage points.

This marked a remarkable change from 2020 when Democratic President Joe Biden beat Trump there by 7.5 percentage points. In 2016Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton beat Trump in that country by nearly 56 percentage points.

With less than two months until he takes office, Trump has unveiled a plan he believes will help encourage Mexico to stop the flow of illegal immigrants and drugs into the United States. statement posted on Truth Social Monday, Trump reflected on the fact that “thousands of people are pouring into Mexico and Canada, bringing Crime and Drugs at levels never seen before.”

Noting how “A caravan coming from Mexico, consisting of thousands of people, appears to be unstoppable in its quest to come through our currently Open Border,” Trump promised to sign an executive order imposing a 25% tariff on all goods coming into the United States. from Mexico and Canada to those countries taking action on what he described as their “absolute right and power” to secure their respective borders with the United States.

Data compiled by U.S. Customs and Border Protection shows that more than 7 million encounters have occurred between illegal immigrants and border officials since October 2021, which marked the first month of fiscal year 2022, Biden's first full year in office. at that time, more than 1.8 million pounds of drugs were seized.