Nearly 200K Border Encounters in July

There were nearly 200K border encounters recorded in the month of July, another indication that the border crisis is nowhere near ending.

According to an update put out by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on Monday, there were 199,976 illegal encounters last month along the southern border.

Here’s some details from the CBP update:

“In total, there were 199,976 encounters along the southwest land border in July, a four percent decrease compared to June. Of those, 22 percent involved individuals who had at least one prior encounter in the previous 12 months, compared to an average one-year re-encounter rate at the southwest land border of 15 percent for FY2014-2019.”

While the update mentions this is a slight decrease from June’s numbers of 207,416 illegal encounters, this is still a historically high number and shouldn’t mitigate the seriousness of the situation.

The update also showed that “74,573 encounters, 37 percent of the total, were processed for expulsion under Title 42. 125,403 encounters were processed under Title 8.”

The number of unaccompanied children also decreased from “13,299 encounters in July compared with 15,255 in June.”

Once again, these “decreases” have to be taken with a grain of salt. This is a record breaking border crisis and minor drops still mean overall numbers are incredibly high.

At the end of July, we blogged about how in FY 2022 there were 2 million illegal border encounters nationwide. The new CBP update indicates that number has risen to 2.2 million illegal border encounters.

This update comes on the heels of the decision to end the “Remain in Mexico” border policy for asylum seekers. While we can’t predict the future, we think it’s safe to say that this move will result in a greater flow of asylum seekers trying to enter the country.

According to a report in Fox News on this topic, tensions are flaring as border state governors have shipped illegal aliens to major cities like New York and Washington, D.C.

“The ongoing crisis has recently sparked a feud between the Republican border states of Texas and Arizona and the Democratic-run cities of New York City and Washington, D.C. The states have been busing thousands of migrants to the cities, sparking pushback and cries for federal aid from the cities’ mayors.”

It remains to be seen what our elected officials in Congress and the Biden administration will do to stem the tide. In the meantime, it’s sadly a safe bet that our porous southern border will continue to see hundreds of thousands of illegal encounters every month.