Mexico is slated to dump around 400 million gallons of sewage into the Tijuana River, which will mostly likely flow into the United States, a decades-old problem that has posed environmental repercussions for beaches and communities, officials said.
Crews are slated to perform maintenance on the sewer system in Tijuana, which sits across the border from San Diego, which continues to be a dumping ground for Mexico’s pollution, San Diego Supervisor Jim Desmond told Fox News Digital.
“Every time there’s maintenance being done on their side of the border, instead of diverting it (sewage) to a treatment plant, it just goes into the river, the gullies and eventually ends up in the U.S., and into the ocean,” he said.
“They put it (sewage) into the big drainage ditch called the Tijuana River that flows downhill, and unfortunately downhill is the United States,” he added.
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Sewage-fouled runoff from the Tijuana River has prompted authorities call for a solution to fix the issue. (Reuters/Mike Blake)
Instead of re-routing the sewage, Mexico has decided to make it a U.S. problem, Desmond said. Toxic waste and sewage runoff from the Tijuana River has persisted for decades, as much of it spills downstream into the U.S., resulting in beach closures.
On Tuesday, Lee Zeldin, who heads the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), said he plans to visit the border in San Diego to address issues pertaining to the “disgusting Mexican sewage” flowing into the U.S.
A group of migrants stand next to a U.S. Border Patrol van after surrendering at the Tijuana river on the US-Mexico border, seen from Tijuana, Baja California state, Mexico, on Dec. 19, 2022. (Photo by GUILLERMO ARIAS/AFP via Getty Images)
Fox News Digital has reached out to the EPA and the Mexican consulate in San Diego.
Mexican officials have no incentive to fix the problem, Desmond said, because the government there hasn’t been held accountable.
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The border fence between Imperial Beach (Right), near San Ysidro, California, and Playas de Tijuana near the Mexican city of Tijuana. (Getty Images)
“I think it’s really time for federal action,” he said. “There needs to be some type of repercussions for those actions. Unfortunately, their lack of an adequate sewage system is our problem. It’s not their problem.”
To convince Mexican officials to fix the problem, the U.S. could restrict the number of people coming across the border and visas, as well as other forms of leverage if beaches have to be closed, Desmond said.
The Tijuana River flows right behind a shopping mall on the U.S. side of the border, which poses health risks for local residents, he said. In addition to beach closures, Navy SEALs and recruits train near the toxic runoff and children and some elderly residents on the U.S. side of the border have gotten sick because of the stench from the runoff, said Desmond.
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“We’ve got to have a better system here as opposed to just being a sewage collection for Tijuana,” he said.
