According to the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS), a group of more than 100 migrants were arrested by authorities in Eagle Pass.

“This morning @TxDPS encountered a group of 116 illegal immigrants arrested in Eagle Pass,” Lieutenant Chris Olivarez, a spokesman for DPS-South Texas, said Thursday in a post on X, formerly Twitter. “Among the group were 11 unaccompanied children, including siblings from Honduras aged 4 and 7, with a piece of paper sent to an address in Alabama.”

The group, including the children, were arrested by the U.S. Border Patrol and taken into custody for processing.

The latest large-scale arrest came after a group of more than 200 illegal immigrants were arrested in Maverick County, according to DPS. According to DPS-South Texas, officers found a total of 204 undocumented migrants, including 57 unaccompanied children ages 8 to 17.

As part of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s $11 billion flagship policy, Operation Lone Star, DPS was deployed to stem the flow of illegal immigrants and prevent drug and human trafficking.

A press release issued after the operation launched in 2021 said it would integrate DPS with the Texas National Guard “to combat the smuggling of people and drugs into Texas.”

Since the launch of Operation Lone Star, the multi-agency initiative has resulted in the apprehension of more than 521,100 undocumented immigrants and more than 47,400 criminal arrests, including more than 41,000 felony charges, according to Abbott’s office, which said Texas is targeting illegal border crossings have reduced in the state by more than 86 percent.

Abbott has deployed barbed wire, buoy barriers and local troops to curb illegal migration.

Immigration was at the forefront of President-elect Donald Trump’s election campaign. The National Border Patrol Council, the union that represents U.S. border patrol agents, issued a statement congratulating Trump on his victory over Vice President Kamala Harris.

Art Del Cueto, vice president of the National Border Patrol Council, said Newsweek: “We view President Trump’s victory today not just as a victory for himself, but as a victory for the entire country. We look forward to working with him, as we have in the past, to resolve the many issues that have affected our country’s borders over the past four years.”

Americans favor a tougher approach to tackling migration, according to a poll conducted exclusively for Newsweek.

In the most recent Redfield & Wilton Strategies poll in October, 68 percent of Americans said the federal government should take a tougher approach to immigration – an increase from 62 percent when the survey began in July 2023 – and just 10 percent opposed such measures .