JD Vance Visits US-Mexico Border

Vice President JD Vance said Wednesday that President Trump hopes to build the entire wall along the southern border by the time his term concludes, an ambitious goal that Mr. Trump was unable to realize in his first term.

Vance made the comments as he, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard made a day trip to the border town of Eagle Pass, Texas, to highlight the Trump administration's efforts to combat illegal crossings and drug trafficking. Their visit comes a day following Mr. Trump's joint address to Congress, in which immigration played a prominent role.

Illegal border crossings at the U.S. southern border have plummeted since Mr. Trump took office, but the president's recent speeches feature fewer mentions of building a physical border wall than they did during his 2016 campaign and first term.

"I think the president's hope is that by the end of the term we build the entire border wall," Vance said. "And of course that's the physical structure, the border wall itself, but we even heard today, there are so many good technological tools. So many great artificial intelligence-enabled technologies that allow us, for example — a camera, not a person, but a camera picks up somebody two miles away who's about to come across the southern border. ... We're using artificial intelligence to make us better at the job of border enforcement, but we've got to make sure that technology is deployed across the entire American southern border. We're going to do it as much as we can, as broadly as we can, because that's how we're going to protect the American people's security."

Vance and Hegseth represent the highest-ranking administration officials to visit the southern border since Mr. Trump's inauguration.

They arrived one day after the Trump administration imposed 25% tariffs on nearly all imported goods from Mexico, citing Mexico's handling of the situation at the border, a move that sent stocks tumbling. A reporter asked Vance what Mexico can do to reverse the tariffs.

"Well what the president says is we need a sustained commitment from the government of Mexico to take the job of border security seriously," Vance responded. "Fentanyl is the single-largest cause of death among young Americans, and we know that a substantial portion of it is — the precursors are made in China, they come to Mexico, they're manufactured in Mexico, and brought across the border by the Mexican drug cartels. We want to see fewer Americans dying of these terrible fentanyl overdoses. We're going to apply as much leverage as possible to the Mexican government."

The Trump administration has seen success in its efforts to crack down on illegal immigration. In February, Mr. Trump's first full month in office, the White House says illegal border crossings reached the lowest level in at least 25 years. And the administration says more than 50,000 people in the country illegally have been removed from the U.S., a figure that includes migrants with violent criminal histories.

The Pentagon had been supplying costly deportation flights for migrants in the U.S. illegally. But two U.S. officials tell CBS News there are currently no Department of Defense flights scheduled to take undocumented migrants to Guantanamo or to other foreign countries. One of the officials said the Department of Homeland Security is currently going with other options, but the Pentagon is standing by in case it is asked to provide more flights.

The 28,000-person town of Eagle Pass, roughly 100 miles west of San Antonio, is in Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales' district. His district spans the majority of the length of Texas' portion of the border with Mexico.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott and Gonzales are present for the visit, and officials held a roundtable to discuss the situation at hand.

"We need new laws to secure the border," Vance said during the roundtable. "We needed a new president. And thank God we have that."

Vance has visited the southern border before. He made a trip to the border wall in San Diego, California, in September.