Vice President Kamala Harris was put in charge of the U.S. border crisis eight months ago and when asked what is being done to resolve the crisis, she didn’t give much insight.
“It’s not something that’s going to be solved overnight, you can’t just flip a switch to make it better,” Harris said.
In January, the crisis began when President Joe Biden signaled to Central American and South American immigrants that America is now open for immigrants. That decision, accompanied by Biden’s switch flipping turn on the border crisis when he put an end to the Trump administration’s Remain in Mexico policy.
That policy forced asylum seekers qualified by the U.S. government arriving at the U.S. border with Mexico to remain in Mexico until their case had been approved.
Biden also flipped another switch to turn on the border crisis when he reinstituted the catch and release policy of releasing illegal immigrants into the U.S. Under the Trump administration, illegal immigrants were either detained until their hearings or returned back to their country of origin.
“CBP’s workforce continues to demonstrate excellence and dedication as they manage heightened travel demands on the border, facilitate a return to normal travel and trade at all our ports of entry, and manage migrant encounters in a safe, orderly, and humane way,” said CBP Acting Commissioner Troy Miller. “In October, CBP saw significant increases in pedestrian, air, and vehicle travel, even as we prepared to allow fully vaccinated, documented travelers resume non-essential travel again in November. CBP also continues to prioritize protecting the American public from illicit activity, interdicting 33,500 pounds of drugs along the Southwest border in October. We continue to work diligently to identify and dismantle transnational criminal organizations that smuggle contraband and migrants into the U.S. October marks the third straight month of declining unauthorized migrant encounters along the Southwest border — with particularly sharp drops in families and unaccompanied children – and CBP’s workforce continues to work with partners across the federal government and throughout the hemisphere to disrupt the smugglers intent on exploiting vulnerable migrants for profit.”
CBP Enforcement Numbers for October 2021
The large number of expulsions during the pandemic has contributed to a higher-than-usual number of migrants making multiple border crossing attempts, which means that total encounters somewhat overstate the number of unique individuals arriving at the border.
- The number of unique individuals encountered in October 2021 was 117,260, an 18% reduction in the number of unique individuals encountered the prior month.
- In total, there were 164,303 encounters along the Southwest border, a 14% decrease compared to September. Of those, 29% involved individuals who had at least one prior encounter in the previous 12 months, compared to an average one-year re-encounter rate of 14% for FY2014-2019.
- Two-thirds (66%) of encounters were single adults, with 108,583 encounters in October, a 4% decrease compared to September.
- 93,676 encounters, more than 57% of the total, were processed for expulsion under Title 42. 70,627 encounters were processed under Title 8.
- 80,242 encounters involving single adults (74% of all single adult encounters) were processed for expulsion under Title 42, with 28,341 processed under Title 8.
- 13,308 encounters involving family unit individuals (31% of all family unit individuals) were processed for expulsion under Title 42, with 29,418 processed under Title 8.
Unaccompanied Children
- Encounters of unaccompanied children decreased 11%, with 12,807 encounters in October compared with 14,358 in September. In October, the average number of unaccompanied children in CBP custody was 595 per day, compared with an average of 772 per day in September.
Family Unit individuals
- Encounters of family unit individuals decreased by 34% from 64,388 in September to 42,726 in October—which less than half the peak of 86,631 in August 2021.