Looking for death? Members of the Mexican Snake Group are heavily armed and mock the U.S. Border National Guard

According to the Washington Observer, Texas authorities said members of the Mexican Snake Group, dressed in military uniforms and armed with AK-47 rifles, had been mocking U.S. soldiers deployed to the southern border, calling it an unprecedented act of provocation.

"What's actually happened over the last week is that we saw a group of people crossing the line, they were smuggling people, what they were doing was crossing rivers into the U.S. and smuggling people, and then back inside Mexico, they were all armed," Christopher Olivarez, a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, said in an interview Wednesday.

"Those are assault rifles, yes, AK-47s. They would stand in the middle of the river and then brandish their weapons and mock the National Guard on the American side," Olivarez said. He also said the Mexicans always wore tactical vests and carried powerful rifles.

Since the U.S.-Mexico border is in the middle of the river, these members of the Mexican snake group are not on U.S. soil.

Such threats had never occurred before this week. Brandon Judd, national president of the U.S. Border Patrol Union, said Wednesday that the Mexican Snake Group profits more than $400 million a month from human smuggling transactions along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Olivarez said "if they pose a threat to the National Guard or raise their weapons," U.S. forces will be allowed to take lethal actions including shooting at themselves in self-defense.

Earlier this week, in McAllen, Texas, a few miles away, five people were shot in a shootout. Olivarez said the shootout was across the border from the Mexican city of Reynosa and involved Mexican criminal group personnel and Mexican officials.