WASHINGTON — Arrests of migrants crossing the southwest border fell for the second consecutive month in July, but the number in the first 10 months of the government’s fiscal year already exceeds the previous year’s total, setting a records, according to data released Monday.
Unauthorized crossings generally decrease during the summer months. Even so, the number of arrests each month continues to be higher than most previous years. This trend has continued since the spring of 2021, a trend that Republicans blame on President Biden’s campaign promise to be more welcoming to immigrants than his predecessor, and the policies of his administration.
At the end of June, border agents apprehended people more than 1.74 million times, breaking the record for the total number in the government’s 2021 fiscal year of more than 1.73 million, which was at the time the the highest number of illegal crossings recorded since at least 1960. The government’s fiscal year ends on September 30, and at this rate the total number of crossings for the year is expected to exceed two million.
Authorities estimate that around 18% of those apprehended in July were multi-traverseers, a trend some blame on the maintaining the application of a public health order based on the pandemicwhich gives border authorities the power to turn back migrants at the border but does not penalize those who cross again illegally.
Many migrants crossing are seeking asylum, which was significantly restricted by several policies under the Trump administration, when there was also a spike in migration. One such policy is the use of the public health rule, known as Title 42, which the Biden administration tried to end in late May.
On Monday, the Commissioner of Customs and Border Protection publicly acknowledged the humanitarian impact of the public health rule. In a Posting on TwitterCommissioner Chris Magnus said the policy, which has been kept in place under court order“has a high cost for many asylum seekers”.
The high number of crossings is due to the fact that The United Nations says there are more displaced people in the world than ever before. Migrants go to great lengths to get to the United States, putting their lives in the hands of smugglers. They are fleeing violence, poverty and life under authoritarian governments in their own country. Many are looking to the United States for economic opportunities after many jobs were lost during the pandemic.
While about half of migrants arrested at the southwestern border were turned back under the public health order, the administration released hundreds of thousands of migrants in the country to face detention proceedings. estrangement. These immigrants are given temporary permission to stay because the government cannot deport them immediately – sometimes because the United States does not have diplomatic relations with the countries from which they come, and therefore cannot repatriate them, or that there is not enough space to hold them.
“The border crisis is out of control,” Rep. Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, said in a Posting on Twitter In Monday.
Immigration continues to be a burning issue in the midterm elections this autumn. A recent Gallup poll found that more people wanted an overall reduction in immigration than they thought in 2020. Most of those who wanted less immigration identified themselves as Republicans, according to the results.