Southern Border Apprehensions Hit an All-Time High Over the Last Year

What’s the story?

• U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on Friday released data that revealed a record number of people were apprehended attempting to enter the country illegally over the course of fiscal year 2021, which ended September 30th.
• CBP apprehended 192,001 unauthorized immigrants in September, which brought the total number of apprehensions for FY2021 to 1,734,686. That total exceeded the previous highs of 1.69 million in 1986 and 1.67 million in 2000.
• September’s 192,001 apprehensions extended the streak of months with at least 170,000 CBP enforcement actions to seven and was the third highest monthly total of FY2021, trailing only the 212,672 in July (the highest monthly total since March 2000) and the 208,887 in August.
• The number of unaccompanied minors apprehended on the Southern border in September was 14,358. That brought the FY2021 total to 146,925 apprehensions of unaccompanied minors, which also set an annual record.
• The CBP chart below compares the total number of monthly border apprehensions from the three preceding fiscal years the most recent fiscal year (FY2021), which had the highest total in each month:

• According to CBP’s latest figures for the Southern border, the agency conducted life-saving search and rescue efforts 12,833 times in FY2021 ― more than the two prior fiscal years combined (4,920 in FY2019 and 5,071 in FY2020).

— Eric Revell

(Photo Credit: CBP Office of Public Affairs photo by Kris Grogan via Flickr / Public Domain)