United States immigration authorities arrested nearly 210,000 illegal aliens attempting to sneak into the country through the southern border in the month of March. An additional 11,000 or so attempted to enter the country via legal ports, despite not having a visa or permission to be in the country.
Fox News’ Bill Melugin reported that 109,549 of those illegal aliens were expelled via Title 42, a public health emergency rule that allows for expedited removal of migrants seeking asylum status. Title 42 is set to expire on May 23. The Department of Homeland Security recently stated that when it is rescinded, America should brace for as many as 18,000 migrants attempting to cross the southern border per day.
Melugin also noted that 80,116 of those individuals were released into the U.S.
“This means there have been 1,026,460 encounters in the first 6 months of FY’ 22, which began on 10/1,” he added. “In the first 6 months of record setting FY’21, there were only 570,826 encounters.”
This means there have been 1,026,460 encounters in the first 6 months of FY’ 22, which began on 10/1. In the first 6 months of record setting FY’21, there were only 570,826 encounters.
This means the first 6 months of FY’22 are up 79% over the first 6 months of FY’21 @FoxNews— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) April 16, 2022
Reuters also noted that an increasing number of illegal immigrants are from countries around the world.
“While more than half of the migrants encountered at the U.S.-Mexico border in recent months have been from the traditional sending countries of Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, migrants have increasingly been arriving from more far-flung places, including Ukraine and Russia,” the news agency stated.
The effects of the immigration crisis have been felt around the country.
Last week, The Daily Wire reported that Portland, Maine, announced that due to the “unprecedented” number of individuals arriving from the southern border, its government would have to delay submitting a budget for the fiscal year 2023 because the city can no longer financially afford to care for the influx of individuals.
“The primary reason for this delay is due to the fact that over the last six (6) months the City has been experiencing an unprecedented volume of asylum seeker arrivals from the U.S. southern border, and record numbers of circumstantially and chronically homeless individuals seeking emergency shelter services,” Interim City Manager Danielle P. West said in a letter addressed to Mayor Kate Snyder (D) and other government officials.
Earlier in April, House Republicans blasted the Biden administration for the “national security crisis at the border.”
The GOP members of Congress warned that the situation at the southern border was a national security crisis impacting every single state and community in America.
“Any time in this country you hear of a drug overdose death, whether it be in Topeka, Kansas, or Syracuse, New York, my hometown, you have to understand that every single community is a border a community, and every single state is a border state because the poison that’s coming across our borders,” Congressman John Katko (R-NY) said at the press conference.
“That’s much more easy to do because of the number illegal aliens coming across is making it impossible to stop and it’s killing kids all over the country,” Kato added in regards to the proliferation of illicit drugs.
Critics of the Biden administration, like the Center for Immigration Studies, place the blame for this unprecedented border surge directly with President Joe Biden, as CIS noted in one recent report:
The main driver of illegal immigration to the United States is President Biden’s immigration policies, or more specifically, his undoing of border policies implemented by Donald Trump that had successfully brought control to the Southwest border. As Bloomberg Opinion explained in January: “Biden’s rush to undo any immigration policies associated with his predecessor has contributed to upheaval at the border and encouraged more people to risk their lives trying to reach the U.S.”
“In the first full 12 months of the Biden administration, Border Patrol has apprehended more than 2.177 million illegal migrants, a number that does not even account for an estimated half-million-plus aliens who eluded Border Patrol and successfully made it into the United States,” CIS added.
For its part, the Biden administration has been providing illegal aliens released into the U.S. with free smartphones to help track them as they move throughout the country.