tractor

Dec. 20 (UPI) — This past weekend, during a routine inspection at an Interstate 25 checkpoint in New Mexico, U.S. Border Patrol agents discovered and apprehended 37 undocumented migrants trying to hide inside a tractor trailer, officials said.

The agents, assigned to the Las Cruces Station in the El Paso sector, heard movement near the rear door of the trailer and, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials, “observed individuals attempting to crouch behind freight.”

A further search revealed 37 migrants hiding inside the cargo trailer, officials said, and none had proper documentation.

The migrants were taken into custody. They come from countries such as Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, El Salvador and Ecuador. They were transported to facilities for further processing under Title 8 authority, officials said.

“Smuggling organizations exploit migrants with false promises of safe passage and easy entry, but illegal entry into the United States often involves tactics that not only violate U.S. immigration laws but also endanger lives,” said El Paso Sector Chief Anthony Scott Good in a release. “We remain focused on enforcing immigration laws, holding smugglers accountable, and applying consequences to those who cross the border illegally or attempt to circumvent the legal immigration process.”

According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials, El Paso sector agents disrupted 24 tractor trailer smuggling events during fiscal year 2024. Agents said 387 migrants have been discovered so far.

For fiscal year 2025, El Paso sector agents have disrupted four significant tractor trailer smuggling operations and have apprehended 97 undocumented migrants.

This kind of operation is nothing new for agents in this particular sector, officials said in the release, adding that El Paso sector agents regularly encounter smuggling tactics used by transnational criminal organizations, and those include concealing migrants in commercial vehicles.

Such activity can be extremely dangerous because of a lack of safety measures used by the smugglers. Individuals are often crammed into confined spaces without adequate ventilation, much less seat belts. Smuggled migrants often are exposed to dangerously high temperatures in the summer, agents say, and freezing conditions in the winter.

Farmers say the tax will destroy family farms and threaten food production, while the gov’t says it’s needed to raise funds.

British farmers have descended on London to call on the government to scrap inheritance tax rules on land ownership, which they say will destroy family-run farms.

On Tuesday, protesters held placards reading “no farmer, no food, no future” and “[Prime Minister Keir] Starmer the farmer harmer” around Parliament Square.

The measure, referred to by critics as the “tractor tax”, was announced last month as part of the new Labour government’s budget to raise funds.

However, the tax has caused backlash from farming communities, who say the government does not understand rural communities.

Before the announcement of the new budget, passing down farms through generations was tax-free.

However, from 2026, a 20 percent tax will be paid on the value of a farm above one million British pounds ($1.27 million).

Farmers, however, say that while their land and machinery are highly valued, their farms have low profit margins, meaning their children would have to sell their land to cover the tax bill.

One protesting farmer, Olly Harrison, told Al Jazeera, “We’re not tax dodgers. If we were making profits, tax our profits. But if we’re not making profits, we can’t pay inheritance tax.”

“We do have these huge land resources that have a value on paper, but in reality when you’re farming it doesn’t mean anything,” he said.

‘Disastrous human impacts’

Emma Robinson, 44, a farmer who joined the protests, told the Reuters news agency that her farm in northwest England has been in her family for 500 years and she plans to pass it down to her children.

“[Now] it’s being taken out of my hands by someone that’s been in Parliament for literally days,” she said.

The government has said the tax change would affect about 500 farms a year, based on the number of inherited farms in 2021-22, with the tax rate payable in instalments over 10 years.

However, farmers say the number of farms affected could be much higher, with the Country Land and Business Association estimating that 70,000 farms are worth more than one million pounds and could be affected.

National Farmers’ Union president Tom Bradshaw said the latest protests would continue for as long as necessary, telling Sky News that the government “cannot have a policy in place which has such disastrous human impacts and think we’re going to go quiet.”

However, the government has reiterated that the actual threshold before paying inheritance tax could be as much as three million pounds ($3.8m) once exemptions for each partner in a couple and for the farm property are considered.

Starmer said on Monday that “the vast majority of farms” will not be affected.