The number of unauthorized crossings by migrants into the United States along the U.S.-Mexico border has fallen by more than 50% compared to the record number of crossings in December 2023, according to a new report citing federal statistics.
According to the U.S. Border Patrol, agents recorded an average of 3,700 apprehensions of migrants along the border each day in the first 21 days of May, a 54% drop from the daily average of 8,000 in December, CBS reported on television late Thursday. channel says it has obtained internal government data.
May is on track to be the third straight month of declines in border crossings, with senior US officials attributing the drop to Mexican authorities’ crackdown on migrants traveling to the US. The figures go against the seasonal trend, where there is usually an increase in the number of crossings in the spring.
U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas praised the reductions in an interview with CBS News on Thursday, citing a “number of actions we’ve taken, not just strengthening our enforcement, not just targeting the smugglers, but also establishing legal routes . that enable persons eligible for assistance to reach the United States in a safe, orderly, and legal manner.”
Related: At the US’s newest border hotspot, aid workers are bracing for volatility
According to human rights officials, Mexican authorities detain migrants before they reach the U.S. border and take them south, sometimes as far as Mexico’s border with Guatemala.
“López Obrador has been very willing to trade the rights of migrants and asylum seekers for political capital in Washington,” Ari Sawyer, a researcher at Human Rights Watch, told the Guardian earlier this year, referring to Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. .
The reported decline in migrant crossings comes as immigration has become a heated political issue among Republicans and Democrats during the 2024 presidential election year. Joe Biden recently proposed changes to asylum procedures in an effort to appease both sides.
The focus on immigration along the border is expected to create more instability throughout the election year, as migrant humanitarian aid groups have noted that financial aid has taken a hit due to escalating political rhetoric.
“The philanthropic funding, I think, because of a lot of anti-immigrant rhetoric from both sides of the aisle, has really dried up,” said Erika Pinheiro, executive director of Al Otro Lado, which provides supplies for outdoor projects. detention places for migrants.
Voters have cited immigration as one of the most pressing issues this election year, with xenophobic fears of an immigration crisis spreading to regions of the US that are far from the US border with Mexico, and have very little exposure to immigration , as well as factors such as aggressive enforcement by Texas, contrary to the jurisdiction of the federal government.
“We don’t see immigrants here, but I have relatives all over the country and they see them,” Jim Schuh, the manager of a local bakery in Rhinelander, Wisconsin, told the Guardian earlier this month.
Senate Republicans blocked a bipartisan border security bill for the second time on May 23 on a 43-50 vote, falling well short of the 60-vote threshold needed to advance the legislation. Four Democrats and two independents voted against the bill.
Biden criticized Republicans and used the blocking of the bill to deflect criticism of immigration from the right to Republicans.
“Republicans in Congress don’t care about securing the border or fixing America’s broken immigration system,” Biden said in a statement. “If they had, they would have voted for the strictest border enforcement in history.”
Republican Senator James Lankford defended the bipartisan border security bill he co-authored against criticism from House Speaker Mike Johnson, but voted against the bill because he claimed the second vote was a push for Democrats to score “political points”.
