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DHS chief ‘horrified’ by images of US Border Patrol confronting migrants

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Sept. 21 said he was "horrified" by images that appear to show US Border Patrol agents on horseback confronting Haitian refugees at the US border.(Provided Photo/Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

(CNN) — Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Tuesday said he was “horrified” by images that appear to show US Border Patrol agents on horseback confronting Haitian refugees at the US border.

“I was horrified by what I saw,” Mayorkas told CNN’s Brianna Keilar on “New Day.” “I’m going to let the investigation run its course. But the pictures that I observed troubled me profoundly. That defies all of the values that we seek to instill in our people.”

He also said US authorities have “moved approximately 4,000, perhaps more than 4,000 migrants, from under that bridge already,” adding that they are moving more migrants “very quickly to other processing centers so that we can ensure their security and safety and the security and safety of the community.”

He added, “We expect to see dramatic change in the next 48 to 96 hours.”

Thousands of migrants — many of them Haitian — have gathered in a temporary site under the Del Rio International Bridge in Texas as they wait to be processed by US immigration authorities. They sleep in the dirt, surrounded by growing piles of garbage, exposed to the elements and without much food and water, in hopes of being processed by the overwhelmed US Border Patrol.