Border crossings in December trend low as Biden administration wraps up

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. officials on Tuesday announced the latest border data, and it suggests the Biden administration is poised to end its term without an expected bump in illegal border crossings.

In December, Customs and Border Protection reported 47,300 illegal border crossings — a slight elevation from November, when it reported 46,612, approaching the lowest level since July 2020. The first two weeks of January also indicate activity has dropped, with about 45% fewer crossings than in December, according to senior CBP officials who spoke with reporters during a virtual press conference Tuesday.

Border crossing activity peaked in South Texas, doubling from about 5,000 in November to slightly above 10,000 arrests in December across the Rio Grande Valley region, despite Republican-led efforts to heighten border security through Operation Lonestar.

The number of border arrests in December exceeded the number of people processed for asylum at ports of entry through the CBP One app, which allows migrants to seek an appointment out of the daily 1,450 slots available at designated ports of entry. Nearly 936,500 people have used the CBP One app to schedule appointments since its introduction in January 2023. Although President-elect Donald J. Trump said in September that he planned to end CBP One appointments, a senior CBP official told reporters that they are still being scheduled.

Overall, the number of crossings demonstrate a downward trend from the high mark set under the Biden administration in December 2023, when arrests reached nearly 250,000. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas credited the Biden administration’s June 2024 proclamation that temporarily suspends asylum processing at the border when U.S. officials deem they are overwhelmed. “This is a consistent trend we have seen since the president’s proclamation went into effect last summer,” Mayorkas said. “Since then, encounters between ports of entry along the southwest border have dropped 60%.”