Eight dead in US car crash as police chased migrant smuggler

HOUSTON: Eight people, several of them from Honduras, were killed on Wednesday in a two-car collision in the southern US state of Texas involving an alleged migrant smuggler attempting to evade arrest, officials said.

Police said the driver of a white Honda was transporting five undocumented migrants and fleeing sheriffs on a road about 100-km from the Mexican border when he passed a truck and collided with another car, killing the couple inside.

Seven victims died at the scene, while an eighth died later in hospital, a spokesperson for the Texas Department of Public Safety told AFP. Several of the migrants who were killed in the white Honda were from Honduras, according to police. US authorities have intercepted some six million migrants at its southern border since President Joe Biden assumed office in January 2021, US Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said on Wednesday.

He added that since May, authorities have “removed or returned” more than 350,000 migrants who do not meet the criteria to stay in the country.

Illegal immigration has become a major political headache for Biden, with Republicans accusing him of lax border policies. Biden has asked Congress for an additional $13.6 billion to reinforce the border with Mexico and hire immigration agents, lawyers and asylum officials.