Biden's border trip will be missing one key thing... MIGRANTS: Crossing where Joe's 'photo op' will take place is now just piles of trash and bored guards who'd have nothing to do since Texas set up concertina wire

Piles of trash and miles of fencing will greet President Joe Biden when he arrives in Brownsville, Texas, on Thursday for the second border visit of his presidency.

What will be missing are illegal migrants crossing the border. 

At Camp Monument, once a bustling center run by U.S. Custom and Border Patrol to process migrants who illegally entered the country in Brownsville, there were few signs of activity on Wednesday. 

Rows of fencing, entwined with concertina wire, shone in the hot Texas sun. The 12-foot-tall wire fence panels are laced with a 3-foot looping layer of concertina wire in order prevent migrants from trying to climbing it. Mexico is visible just across the Rio Grande. 

But there were no signs of anyone trying to make the short crossing over to the United States. Piles of trash lined the river banks, however, left over from six months ago when Brownsville was a major migration hot spot, seeing up to 10,000 crossings a day.

There was a lot of trash but no sign of migrants at Rio Grande in Brownsville, Texas

Two members of the Texas National Guard were stationed in the area and a few CBP agents moved about but they all described the area as 'quiet' when DailyMail.com toured it. The most action was a government patrol car driving along the river bank on the U.S. side.

Border crossings in Brownsville have dropped dramatically in the past months, after Republican Gov. Greg Abbott had miles of the wire fencing installed as part of Operation Lone Star, which he signed into law in December. 

It's unclear why the White House picked Brownsville for the presidential visit on Thursday or if Biden will make announcements about executive action. Biden will meet with U.S. border patrol agents, law enforcements and local leaders as he has come under fire for his handling of the migration issue.

On the same day of Biden's Texas trip, Donald Trump will be in Eagle Pass, an area of Texas still struggling to deal with the migrant influx. The former president will be about 330 miles away from his 2024 rival and the two leaders are not expected to interact.

Internal CBP data for all border patrol stations in February - obtained by Fox News - shows that the Brownsville area had about 462 apprehensions, which averages out to about 17 per day. 

That makes Brownsville, Texas, the 29th busiest border patrol station for the month. The number one station was Three Points in Tucson, Arizona, sector, which has recorded more than 13,900 apprehensions in February. 

Brownsville could give Biden a platform to argue illegal crossings have dropped dramatically given it was the busiest corridor for illegal crossings for nine years. 

But Republicans have called it something else: a 'photo-op.'

'I'm here to predict he's going to do what he did El Paso which is hide every illegal immigrant and put on a photo op that's fundamentally deceptive,' Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas told Fox News' Sean Hannity of Biden's visit.

The White House has said it's House Republicans who are turning the border into a 'political stunt.'

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre pushed back against GOP criticism of Biden's trip, noting it was House Republicans who refused to bring up a vote on a bipartisan border security bill after Trump came out against it.

'Oh, it's very different. What House Republicans have done is nothing, absolutely nothing. If anything, they consistently get in the way,' she said during her press briefing.

'They are turning this into a political stunt by listening to Donald Trump and saying that they need to kill it. This is what they've been doing and making it political where the President got his team now directed his team to work with senators, both Republicans and Democrats to get a bill done.'

Members of the Texas National Guard on patrol at the border - crossings have gone down since Republican Gov. Greg Abbott installed fencing

Last May, before the fencing was installed, lines of immigrants wait at Camp Monument to be processed into the country

President Joe Biden is making his second trip to the border of his presidency on Thursday

Local groups are also upset with the president's quick visit, with one calling it a 'press event.'

Voces Unidas RGV, part of the Souther Border Communities coalition, accused the White House of ignoring local needs 'in exchange for a press event, ironically to meet with law enforcement officers about border security.'

'Despite these visits to the border, despite the photo ops and the press friendly quotes, we remain unimpressed with the Biden Administration's lackluster commitment to our Texas border communities, especially our immigrant, low-income, mixed status communities,' the group said in a statement.

They called on Biden to sit down with migrants.

'If President Biden seeks to be the public servant that people need, he must take the time to sit down with underserved communities to hear where they stand.'

Brownsville has a predominantly Hispanic population, which, at 93.9%, is the third-highest proportion of Hispanic Americans of any city in the U.S.

It's proximation to the border and heavy Hispanic community had made it a hot spot for illegal immigration. Also, with 200,000 people, it's one of the larger cities in the country and able to absorb the migrant influx.

The city is also a Democratic stronghold. And it has a large bus station and airport for migrants to use to leave for other destinations.

The border area near Camp Monument, the area in Brownsville to process migrants

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas visited Camp Monument in May

A welcome to the United States sign in Brownsville, Texas

The border wall between Brownsville, Texas, and Mexico

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas visited Brownsville on May 5, 2023, during a heavy surge of crossings, when upwards of 10,000 asylum-seekers per day were crossing at the border.

Mayorkas went to Camp Monument, which was a tent city established on an old golf course just yards from the banks of the Rio Grande.

At that time, arrests for illegal crossings had topped 2 million over the past two years, more than double Trump’s peak year of just under 1 million in 2019. Now, however, most of the illegal migrant activity is in Arizona and California.

The tent city is mostly gone as quiet settles over Camp Monument. 

Biden and Trump's trips come as the immigration issue ratches to the forefront of the campaign. 

They also come a few days before the Super Tuesday primaries on March 5, when more than a dozen states hold Republican nominating contests.

Both men have railed against each other on the border issue as they try to turn it into election year fodder.

There have been record crossings of the border during Biden's administration, a fact Trump and Republicans have hammered him on. 

And, according to a Gallup poll, immigration is the most common issue mentioned by adult voters who disapprove of Biden’s performance.

The White House has been trying to turn the narrative on the issue, blaming Trump and House Republicans for refusing to support the bipartisan Senate bill. Conservatives argue that piece of legislation didn't go far enough.

The bill included over $20 billion for border security that would add new Customs and Border Patrol agents, add more asylum officers to increase that process time, and add more immigration judges. 

The president also has been under pressure from Democrats, including governors, mayors and senators in border states, to do more on the issue. 

His first trip to the southern border was in January 2023, when Biden spent about four hours on the ground in El Paso, Texas.