At Least 400K Migrants Crossed Border into U.S. this Year

U.S. Border Patrol agents apprehended nearly 400,000 migrants who illegally crossed the U.S.-Mexico border between ports of entry during Fiscal Year 2018. The number of migrants arrested represents a significant increase over the previous year’s total of 303,916.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials reported on Tuesday afternoon that 396,579 migrants were apprehended during the fiscal year that ended on September 30. Of those, Border Patrol agents apprehended 107,212 Family Unit Aliens (FMUA) and 50,036 Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC).

CBP officials previously stated that the numbers represent a “clear indicator that migration flows are responding to gaps in our nation’s legal framework.”

“Our nation faces a dangerous crisis on the border that threatens American communities,” DHS Spokeswoman Katie Waldman told Breitbart News in response to an inquiry about border migration numbers. “Congress refuses to close catch-and-release loopholes in the law that would allow authorities to detain and remove family units safely and expeditiously.”

“The removal of actual family units, or those posing as family units, has been made virtually impossible by Congressional inaction – which will most likely result in record numbers of families arriving illegally in the United States this year,” Waldman stated.

After falling dramatically in Fiscal Year 2017, migrant apprehensions began climbing steadily beginning in May 2017. From April through December 2017 the number of migrants apprehended by Border Patrol agents rose from a low of 11,127 to 28,995. The numbers reversed course for a short period but climbed again to 40,339 in May 2018 and again to 41,486 in September.

Of the nearly 400,000 migrants arrested this fiscal year, more than 250,342 were arrested in Texas — 162,262 in the Rio Grande Valley Sector alone, according to the Southwest Border Migration Report released Tuesday.

During a conference call on Tuesday, senior administration officials told reporters there is a simple solution to the “flood of illegal aliens” who are arriving in “non-removable categories.”  The officials said they need to be able to be able to apply the same rules to Central American migrants that are applied to Mexican migrants — immediate removal. The current process takes more than a full year of federal government resources to remove just a few days worth of migrant arrivals under the current conditions.