Report: US Border Patrol Agents Under Heavy Fire From Mexican Cartels

U.S. Border Patrol agents on the American side of the Rio Grande were taking heavy fire from .50-caliber weapons Friday night when cartels fired at them from the Mexican side of the river, sources told FoxNews.com.

The weapons were fired at the U.S. side of the riverbank in and around the area of the Rincon Peninsula across the Rio Grande from Reynosa, Mexico, at about 8:30 p.m. Texas Rep. Louis Gohmert told FoxNews.com that bullets ricocheted into an area where Border Patrol agents were positioned.

Fox News says sources in the Border Patrol confirmed Gohmert’s story and the use of .50-caliber weapons.

“We don’t have any armor that can stop a .50-caliber round, so our Border Patrol agents had to take cover when the rounds were richocheting around them,” said Gohmert, who has taken a hands-on approach over the last week to the border crisis.

“When the shooting stopped, about 40 to 50 people came out on the U.S. side and turned themselves in. So clearly the rounds were being fired to suppress every effort to stop anybody intervening with anyone or anything coming across,” Gohmert added. “We have no idea what or how many or whom came across with the other illegal immigrants.”

While the dangerous encounter represents the latest instance, it isn’t the first time Mexican drug cartels have been responsible for violent clashes with U.S. Border Patrol agents.

In a letter obtained by Breitbart News, Gil Kerlikowske, the Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, told California Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter that a total of 300 unauthorized incursions have occurred since January 1, 2004. Of those, there were 152 incidents that involved a total of at least 525 armed subjects.

“Of the 152 incidents involving armed subjects, verbal or physical contact was made with the armed subjects in 81 incidents (approximately 322 armed subjects in total),” he wrote, noting that an encounter with the Mexican military or Mexican law enforcement does not always mean a stand off or confrontation. Of the 81 armed encounters, he wrote, 131 subjects were detained.

Border Patrol sources told Fox News that the rounds were easily identifiable as .50- caliber weapons, because of the unique, distinctive noise they make when fired.

“I don’t know why we’re out here like sitting ducks,” one Border Patrol source said. “We need help.”

Border Patrol officials have yet to make themselves available for a comment.

The Rio Grande sector is the part of the 2,000-mile border with Texas that has taken the brunt of traffic from illegal immigrants seeking amnesty in recent months. The migrants, many from Central America, are pouring across the U.S. border due to the president’s failure to enforce immigration law and 2012 executive orders softening U.S. policy. They mistakenly believe the president’s actions allow for them to remain in America once they make it in and, in practice, as of now the law basically does.

The National Association of Former Border Patrol Officers called the border crisis an “orchestrated and contrived assault” by a government with an agenda, and one that is putting the American people at risk. Border Patrol officials have warned that the border is now largely unattended, and vulnerable to cartel and terrorist infiltration.

Often, violence on the border with Mexican drug cartels and corrupt Mexican officials doesn’t end at the border. A few years ago police in Phoenix, Arizona, reported that three members of Mexico’s army conducted a violent home invasion resulting in the assassination of one person and a neighborhood terrorized with gunfire.

The corrupt Mexican military officers were hired by one of that country’s renowned drug cartels to carry out the deadly operation, Phoenix police officials told Judicial Watch. Phoenix police confirmed the soldiers were armed with AR-15 assault rifles and dressed in military tactical gear.

An official police memorandum describes it as a “drug rip,” a tactical assault in which approximately 100 rounds were fired.

Tucson based KVOA reported on the alarming events earlier this year. Now, not only are Mexican Army soldiers firing on American citizens, they are also challenging federal agents and border patrol.

In January, 2014, soldiers from the Mexican Army drew their guns on U.S. Border Patrol agents just 50 yards into the United States. In March, they opened fire on Javier Jose Rodriguez, a young Tucson man visiting family in Sásabe when he was driving around the town early on a Saturday morning. Rodriguez was shot in the arm and in the side, he spent three weeks at University of Arizona Medical Center.

Below, Robert Ayers, a resident of Arivaca, describes the frightening experience that he had with Mexican soldiers who appeared late one night, landing in a helicopter behind his barn. Ayers said several men emerged from the helicopter in military fashion. The men were in full body armor, wearing masks over their faces and carried what appeared to be fully automatic weapons.