Border Patrol agents stationed in South Texas, the busiest region of the U.S.-Mexico border, have encountered more than 10,000 migrants illegally crossing the border this week alone.
Chief Patrol Agent Brian Hastings of the Rio Grande Valley sector announced Friday evening that federal law enforcement agents in the region apprehended 2,000 people on Thursday, making it one of the highest numbers in history. In the first 18 days of March, more than 34,000 people have been stopped while attempting to enter the country illegally.
The figures do not include the number of families, unaccompanied children, and adults who have been encountered by Border Patrol agents working across the eight other regions that span Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California.
RGV agents remained busy on Thursday, apprehending over 2000 illegal aliens. Thursday’s encounters pushed RGV’s weekly total over 10K apprehensions! March monthly totals are now over 34K for #RGV Sector alone.#crossingyourborders pic.twitter.com/nga2wgBI6A
— Chief Patrol Agent Brian Hastings (@USBPChiefRGV) March 19, 2021
“No end in sight as large groups continue entering in the #RGV,” Hastings wrote in an earlier post to Twitter.
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Between Monday and Wednesday, four large groups with 369 people came over the Rio Grande River, which acts as a natural boundary between both countries. Nearly all were children who were not with parents or families. The large groups present a challenge for Border Patrol as it requires charter buses and vans to transport people back to holding stations where people are processed and interviewed.
Border officials anticipate that 117,000 children will arrive at the U.S.-Mexico border without a parent or guardian in 2021. The number is higher than the 68,000 taken into custody during the 2014 surge of solo children and the 80,000 who arrived during the 2019 humanitarian crisis at the border.
Two factors have boosted the number of children and families being taken into custody. First, a new Mexican law blocked families with children who are 7 and older from being returned to Mexico on the basis that shelters cannot accommodate the returns. In response, Border Patrol cannot turn away parents with young children who illegally cross the border.
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Second, the Biden administration in January chose to stop returning Central American children who show up at the border without parents, as was the policy in the final 10 months of the Trump administration. In March 2020, at the recommendation of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, all were returned south of the border to avoid filling detention centers with people amid the coronavirus pandemic. As of March, only adults and some families are being immediately expelled across the border.
