The Trump admin was confronted with chaos at the border. What happened next is surprising.
And now Trump’s border czar has given a very unexpected declaration for the nation.
Trump Administration’s Immigration Enforcement Drives Historic Drop in Border Encounters
Under the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement policies, encounters along the U.S.-Mexico border have dropped to levels not seen in decades, according to federal data. Border Patrol, under the leadership of Border Czar Tom Homan, is experiencing a significant decrease in the number of illegal border crossings, a direct result of the administration’s policy changes and strategic shifts.
On Monday, Homan revealed that there were only 229 Border Patrol encounters along the southern border in the previous day. This number is not only the lowest recorded during the Trump administration but is also the lowest since Homan began his career in 1984. After reviewing historical data, it is clear that such low numbers haven’t been observed since the 1960s, when the U.S. Border Patrol was first established.
To put it in perspective, if Border Patrol agents continued to experience 229 encounters daily, the total for the fiscal year would amount to 83,585, far below the record highs seen in recent years. If the downward trend continues, the final tally for the fiscal year 2025 could be even lower.
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has been tracking border encounters for over fifty years, and a detailed review of this data shows that the average daily encounters have not been this low since fiscal year 1968. At that time, the southwest sectors of the U.S. recorded only 62,640 encounters for the entire year.
In the last 24 hours the US Border Patrol has encountered a total of 229 aliens across the entire southwest border. That is down from a high of over 11,000 a day under Biden. I started as a Border Patrol Agent in 1984 and I don’t remember the numbers ever being that low.…
— Thomas D. Homan (@RealTomHoman) February 17, 2025
Immigration experts point to the Trump administration’s policies as the primary reason for this dramatic reduction in border activity. Eric Ruark, Research Director for NumbersUSA, a Washington, D.C.-based immigration advocacy organization, told the Daily Caller News Foundation, “We’re seeing an unprecedented decrease in the number of encounters at the border. Obviously, that is a Trump effect.”
Ruark went on to explain, “There’s every reason to believe that we’re going to see historic lows when it comes to encounters now between ports of entry and people trying to sneak across… The Trump administration is serious and they’re going to continue to be serious about not just talking about ending illegal immigration, but doing everything they can do to prevent it going forward.”
In stark contrast, under the Biden administration, Border Patrol encountered an average of 5,605 migrants per day at the southern border. The Biden era peaked with more than 12,600 encounters in a single day on December 18, 2023.
Since Trump resumed office, he has implemented a wide range of measures to curb illegal immigration, including issuing executive orders that declared a national emergency at the U.S.-Mexico border and dismantling policies that were considered to encourage illegal immigration, such as the Safety Mobility Initiative and the CBP One app. Moreover, the administration has halted or defunded programs that promoted illegal immigration, including parole programs for foreign nationals.
Trump’s latest executive order, signed Wednesday, aims to eliminate taxpayer-funded benefits to illegal migrants and bans the use of federal funds to support sanctuary policies at the state and local levels. The order also directs agencies to identify and shut down programs that benefit illegal migrants.
The increase in military personnel along the southern border has also provided additional support for Border Patrol agents, creating a stronger defense against the flow of illegal immigration and drug trafficking. Many migrants, discouraged by the administration’s tougher stance, have turned back before even attempting to cross the southern border. This is evidenced by the significant drop in crossings through the Darien Gap, a dense jungle region between Panama and Colombia, which had previously been a major route for migrants headed northward.
This decline in border encounters marks a sharp contrast to the high numbers recorded under the Biden administration, which saw nearly 2.05 million Border Patrol encounters in fiscal year 2023, and approximately 1.53 million in fiscal year 2024. These numbers, combined with CBP encounters at ports of entry, represent the highest and second-highest totals in U.S. history.
Faced with mounting pressure over his handling of the immigration crisis and declining approval ratings, President Joe Biden issued an executive order in June 2024 limiting the number of asylum seekers allowed at the border. Although this did result in a decline in encounters, the figures plummeted even further after Trump’s reentry into office.
House Homeland Security Chairman Mark Green attributed the sharp decline in border activity to Trump’s policies, stating, “The actions taken by President Trump to secure our border and make America safe again have been nothing less than historic, including by reducing illegal border crossings by over 60 percent in his first week in office alone.”
He specifically pointed to Trump’s rollback of programs like the CBP One app and the “fraud-ridden” CHNV program, which allowed the parole of migrants from countries such as Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela into the U.S.
According to Ruark, the current border enforcement measures under Trump’s second term are the most aggressive the country has ever seen. “You had a lot of people initially who weren’t really on board with Trump’s immigration agenda,” Ruark said, referring to his first term. “That’s totally different in the second term… and we’ve seen the results.”
Ruark is optimistic about the future, adding, “We have every reason to be optimistic going forward.” However, he acknowledged the challenges that the administration will face in addressing the large number of illegal migrants who entered the U.S. during the Biden administration. “You had anywhere from seven to nine million people who got in illegally under the Biden administration, and many of them are still here,” Ruark noted. “That’s going to be a huge challenge for the Trump administration.”
Stay tuned to the DC Daily Journal.
