uncovers El Paso drain system used to smuggle migrants
Brooke Taylor uncovers El Paso, Texas’ underground storm drain system, a hidden world exploited by cartels to illegally move migrants from Mexico into the United States. Taylor highlights the extreme danger and harsh conditions within the hot, dark, and tight tunnels. Smugglers are now charging migrants a premium fee of $20,000 to $30,000 for passage through these confined spaces.
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Despite President Donald Trump’s tight clamp on the border, cartels are continuing to attempt to smuggle humans and narcotics by going underground using a vast network of storm drain tunnels in El Paso.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) elite Confined Space Entry Team gave an exclusive look inside the narrow tunnels, which stretch for miles across the region.
There are 32 entry points into the tunnels from the Rio Grande and hundreds of exit points throughout the city. The team said this makes patrolling the tunnels a game of “whack-a-mole” because smugglers can pop out of storm drains at any point. According to CBP, it is much more difficult for Border Patrol agents to detect and intercept smugglers using these secret routes. Nevertheless, they use technology to detect movement underground, monitor entry points and strategically position teams to intercept groups.
The greatest challenge, a team member told , is the heat and the time spent in the tunnels’ thick, low-oxygen air. He said that often by the time they encounter a cartel smuggler, “you’re already exhausted, and now, you have to potentially fight with someone underground.”
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A U.S. Border Patrol agent works at the border to seal an illegal cross-border tunnel which was originally discovered on January 10, 2025, between El Paso and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico on March 11, 2025. (HERIKA MARTINEZ/AFP via Getty Images)
“You can’t call for backup; you can’t call for help. It’s just you and your team versus everybody else,” he said.
Team members said that the number of migrants being smuggled through the tunnels has dropped dramatically under Trump. Whereas there would regularly be groups of 40 to 60 people moving through the tunnels, agents now typically encounter two or three at a time.
Still, the smugglers have not stopped entirely. Reports indicate that cartels have significantly increased their fees for would-be illegal immigrants to take the tunnel routes, with migrants paying $20,000 to $30,000 per person to be guided through the underground routes.
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Mexican police operate to close and secure a clandestine tunnel discovered at the border between Mexico and the United States, in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, on January 13, 2025. The tunnel, used for drug and human trafficking, was secured by the Mexican National Guard and personnel from the Attorney General’s Office, who collected evidence before sealing it permanently. (David Peinado/Anadolu via Getty Images)
CBP also said that smugglers are increasingly using social media to recruit and train guides to navigate the hazardous passageways. The conditions underground are perilous, with poor air quality and intense heat, and El Paso daytime summer temperatures often exceed 100 degrees.
To prepare for this mission, the elite CBP team undergoes specialized training to operate underground, monitor oxygen levels and navigate the tunnels.
got this exclusive look as the Department of Homeland Security announced this week that June marked 14 consecutive months of zero releases at the border, continuing what it touted as an “unprecedented trend of historically low border crossings.”
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CIUDAD JUAREZ , MEXICO – JANUARY 14: American authorities, Border Patrol agents and the Texas National Guard investigate the area where the tunnel between Juarez and El Paso was found in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico on January 14, 2025. While on the Mexican side, two agents and a National Guard patrol car are guarding the entrance to the tunnel that was secured by the State Investigation Agency, on the American side, six Border Patrol trucks, as well as a dozen agents, supported by a machine that was passing over the concrete near where the tunnel was located, were conducting an inspection along the border. ((Photo by Christian Torres/Anadolu via Getty Images))
Daily apprehensions at the border are down 94 percent from what they were during the Biden administration, according to DHS.
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Meanwhile, CBP has broken staffing records this spring, the agency announced, reaching 21,471 agents — the most in the agency’s 102-year history.
Digital’s Leo Briceno contributed to this report.
