(The Lion) — U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters Tuesday that parasitic larvae capable of ravaging several agricultural industries have been detected closer to the U.S. border since the administration began combatting its migration.

New World screwworms (NWS) are fly larvae that feast on the live flesh of mammals, primarily cattle. Rollins said NWS was recently detected about 25 miles from the southern border.

“While the circumstances that allowed the New World screwworm to reach us were years in the making, the response to protect American agriculture began very sincerely and very intentionally in Jan. 20, 2025, and continues today,” Rollins said. “We will not rest until New World screwworm has been eliminated once and for all.”

The USDA posted Wednesday that a case “may have been detected in South Texas.”

The pest has been devastating countries south of the U.S. border, and American officials have been working alongside Mexico to slow its spread by releasing sterile flies that prevent screwworm populations from reproducing. The USDA suspended live cattle imports in November 2024 after NWS was detected in southern Mexico. Imports later resumed under enhanced inspection protocols before being suspended again in May 2025.

Multiple federal agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security, have partnered with the USDA to prepare for a potential U.S. outbreak. The USDA also announced in February the completion of a sterile fly dispersal facility in Texas.

Despite the administration’s efforts, industry experts have warned that NWS could still reach the U.S. and devastate the American beef and hunting industries. Notably, an NWS outbreak in the 1960s was alleviated through unleashing sterile flies, though the agriculture industry suffered a multi-million-dollar loss before the U.S. could eradicate the pest.

Bud Dinges, the executive director of the Texas Animal Health Commission, said “it remains possible that New World screwworm will never reach Texas.”

“However, given the expanding New World screwworm on fly population in Mexico and the severe threat it poses to Texas livestock, livestock and wildlife industries, we now must prepare and act as if it will,” Dinges said.

Rep. Don McLaughlin, R-Texas, posted on X on Monday that NWS was spotted a mile from his state’s border, referencing a February announcement of his in which he stated that “this isn’t something we can afford to ignore or slow-roll in Washington.”

Rollins said she will regularly update the media every few days to combat “misinformation,” though she referred to McLaughlin a “well-intentioned state legislator.”

Rollins said the Biden administration allowed NWS to spread, noting that the Darien Gap, a dense rainforest between Central and South America, used to serve as a vital “geographic and biological barrier.”

Over half a million migrants crossed the Darien Gap on their northward march in 2023, the same year illegal migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border reached record levels. Illegal migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border plummeted in 2025 to their lowest level in more than 50 years, as Trump returned to the Oval Office.

“Unsurprisingly, that security bulwark began to crumble during the previous administration as cartels in South and Central America became entangled in the agricultural industry. They ramped up livestock trafficking with no concern for New World screwworm infestation,” Rollins said. “The last administration refused to take action against those cartels and their partners, and between January and November of 2024 that dominance escalated northward. … That’s how the Darien Gap eventually was breached.”