In early April, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released its border crossing and apprehension numbers for the month of March. And as The Daily Wire has repeatedly noted, the situation was already so dire that CBP Deputy Commissioner Robert E. Perez referred to the onslaught, at the time of the release of the March numbers, as a “system-wide emergency”:
“We are currently experiencing a system-wide emergency in our processing and holding facilities. The humanitarian crisis created by a massive influx of family groups and unaccompanied children in recent months has forced CBP to reallocate resources away from law enforcement, trade and travel missions to process and provide care for those in our custody,” said CBP Deputy Commissioner Robert E. Perez. “The impacts to legitimate trade and travel cannot be overstated. As this crisis continues to worsen, it undermines CBP’s ability to perform its dual mission of protecting our borders and facilitating legitimate trade and travel.”
We are past the point of being in a full-on crisis at our southern border, as even an increasing number of Democrats and venerable leftist media outlets are willing to concede. And yet, as The Daily Wire reported yesterday, the brand-new CBP numbers released for the month are even more harrowing.
It is worth breaking down the numbers a little more. Per CBP’s official data release, total border apprehensions between points of entry in April rose 6.62% over March’s already-record-shattering pace. Astoundingly, April’s apprehension total of 98,977 is a full 94.04% higher than the monthly total from the beginning of the federal government’s fiscal year, in October 2018. In other words, apprehensions between points of entry along the border have nearly doubled in just the first seven months of the current fiscal year. As Daniel Horowitz observes, the combined total for points of entry inadmissibles and apprehensions between points of entry is 109,144, which is the highest monthly total since the second term of the George W. Bush administration. Furthermore, as Horowitz states, “it is very likely the highest number of unique individuals of all time, given that many in the past were the same individuals deported multiple times within the same week, while almost all of these are first-timers.”
It is also worth re-emphasizing the social transformation without representation that is currently transpiring with respect to our immigration numbers from Guatemala and Honduras, in particular. As the Department of Homeland Security has stated, over 1% of the populations of each country have entered the United States since September. But according to immigration policy expert Horowitz’s own math, “the size of these countries’ populations in America equal roughly 6.6% and 9.2% of their respective populations in Guatemala and Honduras.” Those are eye-gouging statistics.
TheBlaze broke down the single adults and family unit tallies: “CBP reported that most of those apprehended in April (58,474 or 59 percent) crossed the border in a family unit. Less than one-third (31,606 or 32 percent) were single adults. In contrast, most of those turned away at the border (6,144 or 60 percent) were single adults.”
CBP sounded the alarm yesterday on its official Twitter feed, tweeting, “As of Sunday, only 7 months into the fiscal year, #BorderPatrol has surpassed the TOTAL Southwest border apprehensions of every fiscal year since 2009.” It also tweeted, “#CBP is experiencing an unprecedented and unsustainable situation at the Southwest border. In April, CBP apprehended or deemed inadmissible 109,144 individuals along the SWB.”
“Unsustainable,” indeed. Hopefully our policymakers are paying attention.