In its latest report, U.S. Customs and Border Protection said that the number of migrant apprehensions between ports of entry in August 2024 was 68% lower than in August 2023.
The Biden administration’s new limits on asylum introduced in June, combined with a coordinated crackdown with Mexico, led to a significant reduction in the number of migrants arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border.
“What we're seeing is sort of two crackdowns layered on top of each other,” said Adam Isacson, director for defense oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America, a research and advocacy organization.
“Each of the crackdowns [in Mexico and the U.S.] reduced migration at the border, in the short term, by just about half,” he explained.
In December 2023, President Joe Biden and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador jointly announced “additional enforcement actions” to address irregular migration after speaking by telephone.
More than 30,000 soldiers of the Mexican armed forces were placed at Mexico’s borders that same month to begin moving migrants into the interior of the country or repatriated to their countries of origin.
In June, Biden highlighted the relationship with Mexico in reducing irregular immigration. “We’ve chosen to work together with Mexico as an equal partner, and the facts are clear,” he said. “Due to the arrangements that I’ve reached with President Obrador, the number of migrants coming to our shared border unlawfully in recent months has dropped dramatically.”
Isacson said that collaboration with Mexico led to the first significant reduction of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border this year. “In early January, Mexico shifted its policy and put out a whole bunch of security forces,” he explained. “That made it harder for migrants to get across Mexico and make their way to the U.S.-Mexico border. From December to January, border patrol apprehensions got cut in half.”
There have been widespread reports of an increase in human rights violations experienced by migrants in Mexico since January. An investigation by Center for Gender & Refugee Studies in May revealed that some migrants in Mexico were stranded in what were, according to the report, effectively open-air prisons, where they were prevented from traveling or working and faced physical violence.
In June, the Biden administration issued an executive order to place new limits on asylum, which immigrant rights organizations condemned as a ban.
Since the order, CBP reported an additional 50% reduction in migrant encounters between ports of entry.
“In early June, the Biden administration added a second crackdown, saying that anybody who comes between the ports of entry has very little chance of accessing the US asylum system,” Isacson explained. “From May to July, we saw another cutting in half of the number of Border Patrol apprehensions”
The limits were part of a strategy by the Biden administration that combines stricter consequences for illegal immigration with an expansion of legal pathways.
CBP is on track to record the lowest number of annual apprehensions along the Southwest border since fiscal year 2020.
