CBP releases migration and enforcement data for fiscal 2024, including a 25% drop in migration and a 26% drop in fentanyl seizures.

Get daily links in your email

Developments

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released data about migration and enforcement at the U.S.-Mexico border during September, which was also the final month of the U.S. government’s 2024 fiscal year. Among key findings:

  • Border Patrol apprehensions of migrants between ports of entry dropped 25 percent from 2023 to 2024 (from 2,045,838 to 1,530,523).
  • Migrants who entered CBP custody at ports of entry, most with CBP One appointments, increased 41 percent from 2023 to 2024 (429,831 to 604,482). CBP had increased appointments to their current level of 1,450 per day in June 2023, near the end of the 2023 fiscal year.
  • Combining Border Patrol and port-of-entry encounters, the nationalities most frequently encountered at the border in 2024 were Mexico (-9% from 2023), Venezuela (-2%), Guatemala (-7%), Cuba (+6%), Honduras (-34%), Colombia (-20%), Ecuador (+5%), Haiti (+16%), El Salvador (-12%), and China (+57%)
  • 38 percent of migrants encountered in 2024 were members of family units, and another 5 percent were unaccompanied children. This is similar to 2023 (33 percent and 6 percent, respectively).
  • In September, Border Patrol apprehended 53,858 people between ports of entry. That is similar to July and August, slightly less than September 2020 when Donald Trump was president during the pandemic, and 78 percent less than the record-setting month of December 2023. The Biden administration’s June asylum restrictions and a crackdown in Mexico continue to suppress migration levels.
  • “Overall, southwest border deaths were down 30% comparing the fourth quarter of last fiscal year to this fiscal year,” CBP reported, without offering aggregate numbers.
  • Seizures of fentanyl fell for the first time since the drug began appearing. CBP seized 21,148 pounds of the potent opioid in 2024, down from 26,718 pounds in 2023 (-26%). Similar to past years, 86 percent of fentanyl seizures occurred at border ports of entry. Of the remaining 14 percent seized by Border Patrol, 4 percent was seized from vehicles at the agency’s interior checkpoints.
  • Seizures of cocaine increased 10 percent and methamphetamine increased 30 percent. Heroin fell 21 percent and marijuana 8 percent.
  • “Cbp Releases September 2024 Monthly Update“ (U.S. Customs and Border Protection, October 22, 2024).
  • Rafael Bernal, “September Border Patrol Encounters Lowest Since the Pandemic“ (The Hill, October 22, 2024).
  • Dan Gooding, “Illegal Border Crossings Keep Falling as Election Day Grows Closer“ (Newsweek, October 22, 2024).
  • Elliot Spagat, “Border Arrests Fall in September in Last Monthly Gauge Before Us Elections“ (Associated Press, Associated Press, October 22, 2024).

“We’ve reached almost 20 flights in 3 months, trying to discourage people from” migration through the Darién Gap region, Panama’s president, José Raúl Mulino, told reporters during a visit to France. Mulino was referring to stepped-up deportation flights being carried out with U.S. support. As a result, the Panamanian president added, migration through the Darién “has gone down (by around 20% so far this year compared to 2023), but my concern is the worsening of the crisis in Venezuela,” EFE reported.

NBC News obtained Department of Homeland Security (DHS) data indicating that the Department has identified about 600 people in the United States with possible ties to the Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan criminal organization. Of those, about 100 are considered “confirmed members of the gang.” As about 600,000 citizens of Venezuela have been released into the United States in the 2020s, the DHS list covers perhaps 0.1 percent of that population.

Analyses and Feature Stories

A week from today (Wednesday, October 30, 5:00 Eastern), join WOLA, Alliance San Diego, the Eagle Pass Border Coalition, Hope Border Institute, and Human Rights Watch for an online discussion of excessive use of force by Texas state National Guard and police personnel on the borderline.

The Migration Policy Institute published a study of migration trends at the border, coinciding with CBP’s release of September and fiscal 2024 data. The analysis finds that the drop in migration results from the Biden administration’s combination of asylum curbs, encouragement of other countries’ enforcement, and expansion of lawful migration pathways. It concludes that the migration reduction’s long-term persistence is impossible to predict given several factors, many beyond the Biden administration’s control.

A group of investigative journalism outlets published a report about “Border 911,” a non-profit led by Tom Homan, who served as acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Director during the Trump administration. The report alleges that Homan’s group, linked to “dark money” efforts and border security contracting, uses disinformation about immigration, particularly the notion that migrants and asylum seekers constitute an “invasion,” to build political support for far-right policies and to undermine electoral processes.

If Donald Trump is elected, his promised “mass deportation” campaign would face fewer obstacles than during his first term, argued a USA Today analysis. It reported a poll finding 45 percent of respondents supporting mass deportation, 49 percent against.

The Washington Examiner noted that Trump’s deportation plan, which the campaign has not described in detail, would face obstacles including its scale, ICE capacity, legal challenges, political backlash, and economic impacts.

Among trends in the Mixed Migration Center’s latest quarterly report on Latin America highlights reduced migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border, reduced Darién Gap migration, and a drop in asylum cases in Mexico. (Last week, Panama released data showing a September increase in Darién Gap migration, led by Venezuelan citizens, though migration remains below levels measured during the first half of 2024.)

On the Right