Gov. Jeff Landry said Monday he would like to speak with his Texas counterpart about the possibility of sending more National Guard troops to the border as Louisiana’s three-month deployment nears its end.
In March, Louisiana began sending three rotations of 50 Louisiana Army National Guard soldiers each to Texas to help secure the border against illegal crossings — a potent political issue for Republicans like Landry and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. Other states have also sent troops to Texas .
Louisiana’s deployment due to wrap up this month has cost around $3 million.
“I spoke to Governor Abbott several weeks ago. We’d like to talk to him again, some more, about maybe sending some more troops down there,” Landry said at a press conference in Chalmette to discuss energy production. “He could use them. I know that the season under which the biggest migratory surge that they see actually happens around this time.”
Landry argued that the presence of National Guard troops from Louisiana and elsewhere has helped deter illegal crossings.
Abbott has attributed a decrease in migrant crossings earlier this year to razor wire, airboats, stacked shipping containers and the military presence. Others note that the Mexican government, facing pressure from the Biden administration, increased efforts to detain people traveling through the country from elsewhere in Latin America.