August 19, 2024

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Developments

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released data late Friday about encounters with migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border through July. It found that Border Patrol apprehended 56,408 undocumented migrants between the border’s ports of entry last month.

• That is a 32 percent drop from June, a 52 percent drop from May, and a 77 percent drop from the record-setting month of December 2023.
• It was the smallest monthly total of Border Patrol apprehensions since September 2020, when Donald Trump was president during the height of the pandemic, and fewer than July 2019 and the monthly average for all of 2019.
• Every nationality with over 100 apprehensions declined from June to July.
• All nine of Border Patrol’s U.S.-Mexico border sectors saw a drop from June to July, as they did from May to June. The San Diego (California) sector was number one in apprehensions, followed by Tucson (Arizona) and El Paso (Texas-New Mexico).
• Another 47,708 people came to border ports of entry, about 38,000 of them with appointments made using the CBP One app.

Combining migrants apprehended at and between ports of entry yielded a July total of 104,116 overall encounters with migrants in July, the fewest since February 2021. 32 percent were from Mexico, 12 percent from Venezuela, and 10 percent from Cuba. Of Venezuelan and Cuban citizens, 97 percent came to ports of entry, in most cases with CBP One appointments. Very few attempted to cross into Border Patrol custody, where the asylum rule and Mexico’s agreement to take those nationalities’ deportees would have made overland deportation very likely regardless of protection needs.

• “Since June 4, Encounters Between Ports of Entry Have Decreased by 55%” (U.S. Customs and Border Protection, August 16, 2024).
• Maria Sacchetti, Nick Miroff, “Illegal Border Crossings Fell in July to Lowest Level in Four Years” (The Washington Post, August 16, 2024).
• Isabela Dias, “Migrant Encounters at the Border Hit Lowest Number in Four Years” (Mother Jones, August 17, 2024).
• “Border Arrests Drop 33% to a 46-Month Low in July After Asylum Restrictions Take Hold” (Associated Press, Associated Press, August 16, 2024).
• Sandra Sanchez, “‘Significant’ Drop in Migrant Encounters in July — Lowest Since 2020, Cbp Reports” (Border Report, August 16, 2024).
• Lucas Jackson, “Migrant Crossings at the Mexico Border Plummet: A Deep Dive Into the Decline” (La Voce di New York, August 17, 2024).

Much of the recent drop in apprehensions owes to the Biden administration’s early June rule (currently challenged in court) that almost completely cuts off asylum access for migrants apprehended between ports of entry. CBP reports deporting more than 92,000 people to over 130 countries since the rule went into effect.

As a result of the policy change, Border Patrol released just 12,106 people into the U.S. interior in July with notices to appear in immigration court, down from 27,768 in June and a record high of 191,782 last December.

Nearly half of those apprehended (27,313 of 56,408) were placed in expedited removal proceedings. Under the June rule, these proceedings required them to prove a higher-than-usual standard of “credible fear” in order to access the U.S. asylum system. The rule caused a sharp drop—from 55 percent to 24 percent—in the share of migrants expressing fear of return, Camilo Montoya-Gálvez of CBS News reported, citing an August 16 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) court filing.

• Camilo Montoya-Galvez, “Under Biden Border Move, Fewer Migrants Are Released Into the U.S. or Screened for Asylum” (CBS News, August 18, 2024).

Amid the reduced number of migrants being apprehended between ports of entry, Border Patrol most days is dropping off “single-digit” numbers of migrants at the El Paso area’s largest migrant shelter, USA Today reported. (Those released to the shelter after receiving CBP One appointments exceed 100 daily.)

• Lauren Villagran, “After Record-Breaking Years, Migrant Crossings Plunge at Us-Mexico Border” (USA Today, August 16, 2024).

Panama’s new president, José Raúl Mulino, said that U.S.-backed flights deporting migrants from the Darién Gap region are to commence on August 20 (Tuesday). “I sincerely regret it in my soul, because I know why many of them are fleeing,” Mulino told Univisión. “The political crisis in Venezuela is choking them”. Flights will go from Panama to Colombia.

• “El 20 de Agosto Inician los Vuelos de Retorno de Migrantes Que Crucen Darien, Segun Mulino” (EFE, Swissinfo.ch, August 17, 2024).

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump will visit the border in Arizona on Thursday, the day that presumptive Democratic nominee Kamala Harris is to give her acceptance speech at the Democratic Convention. He “is expected to engage with the border patrol union,” Bloomberg reported.

• Hadriana Lowenkron, Stephanie Lai, “Trump to Visit Border in Bid to Counter Harris Convention Speech” (Bloomberg, Yahoo!, August 18, 2024).

Texas Attorney-General Ken Paxton (R), who has been investigating and intimidating border-area charities that shelter migrants released from CBP custody, is now going after the non-profit status FIEL Houston, an immigrant rights group. Paxton contends that FIEL, which criticizes the Texas state government’s hard-line migration policies, violates its tax-exempt status by being too vocal about legislation and electoral politics.

• Benjamin Wermund, “Ken Paxton Sues to Shut Down Houston Immigration Nonprofit for Posts Criticizing Trump, Abbott” (The Houston Chronicle, August 16, 2024).

In Tijuana, organized crime extortion is so pervasive that even small businesses like sidewalk vendors must pay $100 per week or be violently forced out of business. The fees have jumped in 2024, Border Report reported.

• Salvador Rivera, “Cartels ‘Squeeze’ Small Businesses, Sidewalk Vendors in Tijuana” (Border Report, August 16, 2024).

Analyses and Feature Stories

The Los Angeles Times’s Andrea Castillo noted how down-ticket Democratic candidates for congressional seats are running ads featuring law enforcement personnel and attacking Republican opponents on the border issue, portraying them as obstructing legislative efforts to crack down on migration.

• Andrea Castillo, “In Political Ads, Democrats Go on Offense About Border Security” (The Los Angeles Times, August 19, 2024).

Republicans, meanwhile, spent over $247 million during the first half of 2024 on campaign ads with border and migration themes, nearly always as scare tactics. Of 745 ads surveyed, about 20 percent used out-of-context and outdated visuals, and a similar portion used derogatory terms like “illegals,” “aliens,” or even “murderers” or “rapists.” Ads were heavily focused in media markets far from the border, like Ohio, Indiana, and Montana.

• Azi Paybarah, Clara Ence Morse, Irfan Uraizee, James o’toole, Jonathan Baran, “Republicans Flood Tv With Misleading Ads About Immigration, Border” (The Washington Post, August 18, 2024).

The Washington Post looked at Kamala Harris’s record on the border and migration during her vice presidency, which consisted largely of an effort to address root causes of migration from Central America.

• Maria Sacchetti, Toluse Olorunnipa, “What Kamala Harris Did – and Didn’t Do – on Immigration and the Border” (The Washington Post, August 17, 2024).

Politico looked at Harris’s experience launching a task force to fight cross-border gang activity during her tenure as California’s attorney-general. In doing so, “she engaged the very people and law enforcement unions and others that had opposed her” campaign for the post, her former campaign manager said.

• “Kamala Harris Learned a Lesson About the Border Early in Her Career. It’s Paying Off Now.” (Politico, August 17, 2024).

The New York Times looked at how Donald Trump, if elected, might use the U.S. military on U.S. soil in ways without precedent in modern U.S. history, probably by invoking the Insurrection Act. They include using soldiers to carry out Trump’s promised mass deportation of undocumented migrants. The BBC looked at this, as well as what ICE’s cooperation with local law enforcement would look like in this “mass deportation” scenario.

• Charlie Savage, Jonathan Swan, Maggie Haberman, “Deploying on U.S. Soil: How Trump Would Use Soldiers Against Riots, Crime and Migrants” (The New York Times, August 17, 2024).
• Bernd Debusmann Jr, Mike Wendling, “How Would Trump’s Promise of Mass Deportations of Migrants Work?” (BBC (UK), August 16, 2024).

An American Immigration Council fact sheet broke down the $409 billion that the U.S. government has spent on immigration enforcement since DHS began operations in 2003. It noted that, adjusted for inflation, Border Patrol’s budget has increased 765 percent since 1994.

• “The Cost of Immigration Enforcement and Border Security” (American Immigration Council, August 16, 2024).

Visiting small-town Ohio, the New York Times’s Jazmine Ulloa found widespread belief in the false conspiracy theory that Democrats are encouraging undocumented migration in order to enroll migrants as pro-Democratic voters.

• Jazmine Ulloa, “In Jd Vance’s Backyard, Conspiracy Theories About Migrants and Voting Abound” (The New York Times, August 18, 2024).

On the Right

• Kenzie Beach, “Arizona Sheriff Talks Declining Border Crossings; Doesn’t Credit Biden Admin’s Crackdown” (FOX 10 Phoenix, August 18, 2024).