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Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday announced the state is going to target a Venezuelan gang that he said was notorious for brutal violence and murder and posed a threat to Texans’ safety.
At a press conference in Houston, Abbott signed a proclamation that declares the Tren de Aragua gang a foreign terrorist organization, and directed the Department of Public Safety to create new strike teams of highway patrol officers, SWAT teams, helicopters, canines and Texas Rangers to target areas with known TDA activity.
“We will bring the full weight of the government against the TDA by declaring TDA a foreign terrorist organization,” Abbott said before signing the proclamation. “Texas will use the courts to halt their operations, use civil asset forfeiture to take their property, use enhanced criminal penalties to keep them in jail, behind bars for longer periods of time.”
The governor singled out El Paso as a hotbed for recent criminal activity by suspected members of Tren de Aragua. He said residents there had recently been concerned about criminal activity in a local hotel where 20 suspected Venezuelan gang members were arrested.
El Paso County has denied “the hotel was taken over by any gang” and said it was shut down because of a lawsuit focused on broad criminal activity at the hotel.
“It's important to clarify that this lawsuit was not prompted by criminal activities attributed to any specific group or gang,” El Paso County Attorney Christina Sanchez said in a statement. “I want to be clear that at no time did we allege in our lawsuit that the hotel was taken over by any gang or group of individuals.”
Abbott also said a law the Legislature passed last year would be used against members of Tren de Agua who smuggle immigrants. Under Senate Bill 4, people convicted of smuggling immigrants or operating a stash house receive a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison.
“We are not going to allow them to use Texas as a base of operations to terrorize our citizens,” Abbott said at the press conference, where he was joined by DPS Director Steve McCraw, Texas Border Czar Mike Banks and National Border Patrol Council Vice President Chris Cabrera.
Abbott’s announcement comes on the heels of false claims by former President Donald Trump and other GOP leaders of Venezuelan gangs “taking over” a Colorado apartment complex.
In July, the U.S. Department of the Treasury declared Tren de Aragua a transnational criminal organization that posed a threat to American communities. The gang focuses on human smuggling but also has engaged in human trafficking, extortion, and drug trafficking, according to the Department of the Treasury.
The U.S. State Department also announced reward offers of up to $12 million for information leading to the arrest or conviction of the gang’s leaders.
A database identifying who is involved in the gang does not currently exist, Abbott said, and Texas law enforcement officers will work to create one. According to Abbott, there has been Tren de Aragua activity in Texas since 2021, and more than 3,000 undocumented immigrants from Venezuela have been arrested in Texas for crimes, and another more than 200 are wanted.
“I could sit up here and throw statistics at you and give you numbers as far as how many people are crossing and how many got away,” said Cabrera, the Border Patrol council’s vice president. “But none of that would really matter when dealing with the issue that we have here with this gang.”
Across the country, the gang has been linked to more than 100 law enforcement investigations, Abbott said, including the shooting of two New York City police officers.