Arizona border rancher who saw MS-13 on his ranch has dire warning: 'We have cartel scouts on our mountains'

 

A fifth-generation Arizona rancher said an influx of illegal migrants crossing his land in recent years has increased his fear that terrorists are successfully sneaking into America.

"It's really a serious issue," Jim Chilton, owner of the Chilton Ranch, told Fox News. "We have no security on our ranch nor in most places along the border anymore. It's not good. It's not better in any sense. It's still outrageous."

The ongoing crisis at the southern border is breaking records as illegal migrant entries skyrocket, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data. The first week of December saw a record-setting 18,900 migrant apprehensions in Arizona's Tucson Sector alone, the section's Chief Border Patrol Agent John Modlin said.

By comparison, that's about 2,000 more encounters than all of December 2021 for that sector, according to CBP data. Daily encounters also reached a new record-high across the southern border earlier this month, with more than 12,000 migrants flooding in on Dec. 4.

"It's a national security issue," Chilton said. "I'm very concerned that terrorists are coming across the border."CBP encountered 169 people on the FBI terror watch lists between ports of entry at the southern border in fiscal 2023, data show. That total exceeded not only the previous year's record-setting 98 encounters, but the last six fiscal years combined.Chilton fears more cartel members crossed his property without his knowledge this year. He said cartels fight for control of the trails through his ranch, and he's occasionally seen coyotes smuggling migrants across his land.

"We have cartel scouts on our mountains," he said. They "really have control of everything."The fifth-generation rancher is frightened that cartels flood certain areas with migrants to divert Border Patrol agents, creating undermanned sections where smugglers can bring in terrorists and drugs. The port of entry in Lukeville, Arizona, for example, closed Dec. 4 so that agents could address an illegal migrant surge nearby.

"It's a method of controlling where everybody goes. It's a method for opening up other routes for crossing really bad guys, drug packers," Chilton previously told Fox News. "The cartel is running drugs and bad people across other areas."...more