Coast Guard cutter intercepts boat with 16 Mexicans off coast of California

The Coast Guard intercepted a vessel with 16 amerciable aliens connected committee astir 15 miles disconnected the seashore of Mission Bay successful California connected Sunday morning.

The Coast Guard said successful a property merchandise that astatine astir 12 a.m., cutter Active notified Joint Harbor Operations Center of a 25-foot panga-style vas with astir 15-20 radical connected board, astir a mile southbound of their position.

A panga vessel is simply a narrow, high-bowed benignant of vas often utilized by cause and quality smugglers. The cutter Active and a U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Air and Marine Operations vessel unit launched boarding teams to measure the situation.

During the investigation, the Coast Guard boarding squad discovered 16 immigrants aboard the panga.

COAST GUARD INTERCEPTS BOAT CARRYING ILLEGAL MIGRANTS AS EXPULSION FLIGHT OPERATIONS BEGIN

The Coast Guard cutter Active intercepted a vessel carrying 16 amerciable immigrants 15 miles from Mission Bay successful California connected Sunday morning. (US Coast Guard)

The archetypal interviews with the immigrants recovered they each claimed to beryllium from Mexico, the Coast Guard said.

All the immigrants were transferred into U.S. Border Patrol custody.

"The Coast Guard remains committed to protecting lives astatine oversea portion moving alongside our national partners to combat illicit maritime activities," the Coast Guard said. "These operations item the coordinated efforts betwixt agencies to unafraid our maritime borders."

Last week, the U.S. Coast Guard conducted respective "alien expulsion formation operations" betwixt California and Texas, which included intercepting a vessel carrying amerciable migrants that was sinking successful U.S. waters.

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The U.S. Coast Guard shared a photograph of amerciable migrants detained by the bureau successful January 2025. (U.S. Coast Guard)

A photograph shared by the subject subdivision connected X showed crews aboard the Active intercepting a vas carrying 9 amerciable migrants bound for San Diego.

"The migrant vas began to descend soon aft the Active unit stopped the voyage," the station read. "All persons aboard the sinking vas were safely removed and transferred to CBP."

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U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Linda Fagan was removed from her station aft President Trump returned to the Oval Office. (Getty Images)

Fox News Digital archetypal reported that President Donald Trump fired the commandant of the USCG, Adm. Linda Lee Fagan, implicit concerns astir the border, recruitment and an "erosion of trust."

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Officials claimed Fagan failed to code borderline information threats, provided insufficient enactment successful recruitment and retention, had an excessive absorption connected diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, and covered up Operation Fouled Anchor, which was the Coast Guard's interior probe into intersexual battle cases astatine the Coast Guard Academy.

Fox News Digital’s Alexandra Koch contributed to this report.