Most Americans probably couldn't find the Republic of the Congo on a map if you paid them but Congolese natives are finding their way to Texas.
San Antonio officials are struggling to find French-speaking volunteers for assistance with processing hundreds of Congolese migrants arriving in Alamo City.
Interim Assistant City Manager Dr. Collen Bridger said, "We didn’t get a heads up. When we called Border Patrol to confirm, they said, ‘yea another 200 to 300 from the Congo and Angola will be coming to San Antonio,'" after a group of 350 African migrants arrived unexpectedly.
Bridger told the local CBS affiliate that they are looking for volunteers who can speak French. “If you speak primarily French and can come spend six, seven, eight hours, that would be really helpful,” Bridger explained.
The City of San Antonio apparently expected to be able to move the Congolese migrants along to Portland, Maine. “When we reached out to Portland Maine they said, ‘Please don’t send us any more. We’re already stretched way beyond our capacity,” Bridger stated. Instead, the City is now attempting to locate other localities that will accept these migrants.
South and central African migrants began illegally crossing the South Texas border on May 30 when 117 migrants from the Republic of the Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Angola crossed in the Del Rio Sector. By June 5, more than 500 African migrants had crossed illegally in this single Border Patrol sector, Breitbart News reported.
In a press call on Wednesday afternoon, Brian Hastings, U.S. Border Patrol Chief of Law Enforcement Operations, told reporters this was the first large group “ever recorded in Border Patrol history solely from Central and South Africa. We’ve never seen that demographic in a large group of that size before.”
Photo of Congolese migrants by Getty Images