WH: 'Our Border Enforcement Measures … Continued to Limit Unlawful Immigration’
(CNSNews.com) - White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre on Tuesday downplayed the latest numbers on encounters with migrants at the border, blaming them on seasonal trends and adding that the numbers are down when compared to a year ago.
As CNSNews.com reported, Customs and Border Patrol reported that it encountered 191,899 migrants at the southwest border between ports of entry and at ports of entry in March. That’s a 22.39 percent increase from the 156,787 encounters recorded in February, but a 13.78 percent decline from the 222,574 encountered in March 2022.
“I wanted to ask you about immigration. We’re preparing for — next month, for Title 42 to lift and for more people to be eligible to apply for asylum. We saw that new border numbers are out for March and that there’s been — the vast majority of migrant encounters are from Mexico and Central America,” a reporter asked.
“I know you’ve got a program separately for a couple other nations where you saw a lot of people coming from there, but can you talk about how you’re preparing for next month and particularly with people coming from these particular nationalities?” she asked.
“So two things — you kind of asked a couple of things. Let me just touch on the March numbers for a second, as you just stated. Look, what we believe is: Our border enforce- — enforcement measures and what we have seen continued to limit unlawful immigration. So that is important to note,” Jean-Pierre said.
“We typically see an increase in border encounters this time of the year as weather — as you — I’m sure you’ve reported — as weather gets warmer, and we — you know, but what we want to note and what’s notable is that the seasonal increase this time around was the lowest in two years,” she said.
“And the number of people attempting to cross unlawfully last month was down about 23 percent from this time last year, and we’ll continue to do what we can to build a safe, orderly, and humane immigration system, but as you’ve heard me say many times, Congress needs to act and to also show that they truly show — have real concern and not do political stunts when it comes to the border,” the press secretary said.
“As we — as you’ve heard from the Secretary of Homeland Security, they put out a plan back in January on what the process would look like, and we’re continuing to implement that plan once Title 42 is lifted,” she said.
“And as you know — and we’ve talked about this — we’re expanding legal pathways like parole — parolee — parolee program immi- — for migrants from Venezuela, Nicaragua, Haiti, and Cuba, and we have actually seen the numbers come down by more than 90 percent,” Jean-Pierre said.
“We’re working with our partners across the Western Hemisphere to jointly manage migration patterns. We’re surging additional — additional resources, including personnel and technology to the border. And we’re ramping up ex- — expedited removals under Title 8,” the press secretary said.
“So, again, we — the Department of Homeland Security put out their — their plan back in January, and they’re going to be implementing that plan, and I just laid out some of the things that they announced that they’re going to be doing, and we’re going to be really focused on making sure that we have a humane, orderly process when it comes to the border,” she said.
CBP: 82 Individuals on Terror Watchlist Caught Crossing U.S.-Mexico Border So Far in FY2023
(CNSNews.com) - "I anticipate terminating the national emergency concerning the COVID-19 pandemic on May 11, 2023," President Joe Biden said in February.
The end of the COVID emergency means that Title 42, the public health authority, will no longer be used as grounds to immediately expel illegal border-crossers.
As the March numbers suggest, the anticipated end of Title 42 next month may prompt another surge at the nation's borders.
Terrorist watchlist
Of particular concern is the growing number of people on the terrorist watchlist apprehended between ports of entry.
CBP says in the first six months of Fiscal Year 2023, 80 people named in the Terrorist Screening Dataset (TSDS) have been apprehended between ports of entry at the southwest border; and 2 have been apprehended at the northern border, for a total of 82 so far this fiscal year.
CBP apprehended a total of 98 people with TSDS records in all of Fiscal Year 2022 -- all 98 at the southwest border.
Of course, no one knows how many suspected terrorists evade detection.
(The Terrorist Screening Dataset – also known as the terrorist “watchlist” – has evolved over the last decade to include individuals who represent a potential threat to the United States, including known affiliates of watchlisted individuals.)
Southwest border
In March, U.S. Customs and Border Protection says it encountered 191,899 undocumented migrants at the southwest border between ports of entry and at ports of entry.
That's a 22.39 percent increase from the 156,787 encounters recorded in February, but a 13.78 percent decline from the 222,574 encountered in March 2022.
The chart below shows how illegal immigration has soared at the southwest border since Joe Biden became president in January 2021.
In fact, as the Republican National Committee noted, the 191,899 foreigners encountered in March makes it the 25th month in a row encounters have been above 150,000 at the southwest border.
Going deeper into the numbers at the southwest border:
-- Single adults (133,292 of them) accounted for 69.45 percent of total illegal southwest border-crossers in March.
-- 87,662 (or 45.68 percent) of those southwest border-crossers were expelled under Title 42, which -- as noted -- ends next month.
-- 77,010 (or 40.13 percent) of those illegally crossing the southwest border in March came from countries "other" than El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Mexico.
-- Encounters of unaccompanied children at the southwest border increased 14 percent, with 12,374 encounters in March compared with 10,845 in February.
-- In March, the average number of unaccompanied children in CBP custody was 464 per day, compared with an average of 438 per day in February.
-- Encounters of family unit individuals increased by 38 percent from 33,291 in February to 45,964 in March -- which is a 47 percent decrease from the peak of 86,626 in August 2021.
Northern border
Recent press reports note that illegal migration also is accelerating at the northern border with Canada, and the March numbers bear that out.
In March, CBP encountered 15,774 undocumented migrants at the northern border, the second highest number on record, as the chart below shows.
12,792 of those 15,774, or 81.09 percent, were single adults.
Nationwide
Nationwide encounters in March -- including the northern and southern border as well as arrivals by sea -- totaled 257,910, as the chart below shows.
183,166 of those 257,910 undocumented arrivals, or 71 percent, were single adults.
People from Mexico, Central America and South America account for the majority of nationwide encounters, but CPB also lists other nationalities encountered in March, as follows: China, 4,388; Russia, 5,271; Ukraine, 6,676; Cuba, 6,817; India, 9,648; Turkey, 2,307; Romania, 484; Myanmar/Burma, 381.
You can find more nationwide citizenship numbers here.
"Joe Biden refuses to address the crisis his open border agenda created," the Republican National Committee said in its reaction to the March encounters.
"Drug cartels and human smugglers thrive under Joe Biden’s watch as deadly fentanyl and traffickers pour into our communities. American families are thankful House Republicans will continue to hold Biden and Democrats accountable for their failures."
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