U.S. border officials apprehended more than 200,000 illegal immigrants at the southern border during May, when Title 42 immigration policies expired, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) said on June 20.
The 204,561 total arrests is a 15 percent decrease from May 2022, when agents apprehended 241,136.
Border Patrol stated that 98,850 individuals illegally crossed the southwest border from May 1 to May 11, ahead of the expiration of Title 42—a COVID-19-era authority that allowed border officials to turn away and expel migrants from the United States.
After May 11, another 70,394 illegal immigrants were arrested, according to Border Patrol.
White House Says Plan Is Working
The Biden administration has claimed early successes in addressing illegal immigration at the U.S.–Mexico border since Title 42 ended.“As a result of comprehensive planning and preparation efforts, there has been a significant reduction in encounters along the Southwest border since the return to full Title 8 immigration enforcement on May 12,” Acting CBP Commissioner Troy A. Miller said on June 20.
Republicans Doubt Border Figures
Republican lawmakers have questioned the true efficacy of the Biden administration’s border policies.At a House Homeland Security Committee hearing last week, Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) asserted there have been about 1.5 million people known to have illegally crossed the border but then evaded Border Patrol agents, dubbed as “known gotaways.” Higgins said the number of “unknown gotaways” could be double that of the “known gotaways.”
Republican states have filed multiple lawsuits challenging the Biden-era asylum policies. The stated goal of the Biden-era asylum rule is to create a rebuttable presumption that applicants are ineligible for asylum in the United States if they didn’t apply for asylum in other countries through which they passed first.