2023 has been the worst year on record at the border, with a staggering 3.2 million encounters nationwide, according to a report from the House Committee on Homeland Security.
“Encounters at the Southwest border (SWB) in FY2023 increased over 40% since FY 2021, 4% compared to FY2022, and more than 100% compared to FY2019,” the report explains. A total of 2.47 million illegal immigrant encounters were reported at the southern border in fiscal year 2023.
But there were also an additional 189,402 illegal immigrant encounters at the northern border during 2023, marking roughly an increase of 80,000 encounters since last year and a shocking jump up from just 27,180 northern border encounters in 2021.
The committee factsheet highlighted the increase in border encounters in 2023 compared to previous years, calling the figure “another unprecedented milestone under Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and President Joe Biden’s open-borders policies.”
Overall, there was a total of 3.2 million illegal immigrant encounters nationwide, a press release from the committee reported. But the shocking figure does not include the 1.7 million known illegal immigrant gotaways who’ve entered the country under the Biden administration since fiscal year 2021.
The surge shows no sign of subsiding, with data from September showing drastic increases in encounters compared to the same month in previous years. “Last month, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported a 40% increase compared to September 2021 and 18% compared to September 2022,” the report explained. “Encounters at the Northern border in September 2023 increased 409% compared to September 2021 and 41% compared to September 2022.”
With record numbers of border encounters, the report from the Homeland Security Committee honed in on the national security threat posed by mass illegal immigration. “In FY 2023, 169 individuals whose names appear on the terrorist watchlist were stopped trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border between ports of entry,” the report states before adding that 18 were apprehended in September alone.
The figure marks a “72% increase from FY2022 for apprehensions of individuals on the terrorist watchlist, and is the most on record,” it warns.
“So far in FY2023, CBP has arrested 35,433 aliens with criminal convictions or outstanding warrants nationwide, including 598 known gang members, 178 of those being MS-13 members,” the fact sheet reads, also stating that Customs and Border Patrol “has seized 27,293 pounds of fentanyl, coming across the Southwest border—enough to kill around 6 billion people.”
While the figure marks an 88% increase from fiscal year 2022, the report also warns that “Federal officials estimate they are only able to seize 5-10% of all illegal drugs smuggled across the Southwest border.”
“As this disaster spirals further out of control, the Biden administration does not know how many dangerous illegal aliens are entering the country undetected, especially as Border Patrol agents are being pulled off the front lines to help process and release the historic number of illegal aliens flooding the border,” the press release from the Homeland Security Committee charges. “Mayorkas simply continues to double down on his mass-parole programs, incentivizing and facilitating the entry of otherwise inadmissible aliens into the United States at a scale never before seen.”
The report comes after the House Homeland Security Committee, led by Chairman Mark Green (R-TN), revealed that over a quarter million “inadmissible aliens” have been let into the United States through the CBP One app, a digital platform expanded under the Biden administration that allows foreign nationals to remotely schedule asylum appointments. An overwhelming 95.8% of all aliens who used the app were allowed into the country, including those from China, Afghanistan, Russia, Venezuela, and several other countries.
But the overwhelming wave of illegal immigration could backfire on the Democrats at the ballot box, with a recent poll from CBS News found that a commanding majority of voters, 66%, said that they disapprove of President Biden’s handling of immigration. Just 34% said that they approve.