Some speculated that the end of Title 42, a policy used amid the COVID-19 pandemic to turn back migrants at the border, would bring an influx of crossings.
Biden administration officials said Monday that the number of migrants crossing the southern border had dropped dramatically over the weekend, following a significant increase early last week in the lead-up to the expiration of Title 42.
Blas Nuñez-Neto, a lead Department of Homeland Security official in the Biden administration, said there had been a 50% decrease in crossings over the weekend, compared to the more than 10,000 a day they had seen early last week. He said that, over the weekend, they had averaged below 5,000 encounters a day.
“It is too early, but the numbers that we have experienced over the past two days are markedly down over what they were prior to the end of Title 42,” DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said on CNN on Sunday, adding that there had been 6,300 crossings on Friday and around 4,200 on Saturday.On Monday, Raul Ortiz, head of the U.S. Border Patrol, said they had apprehended 14,752 migrants in the previous 72 hours.
At the same time, the administration is facing a lawsuit from the Florida attorney general’s office, which won a temporary block on a policy that allowed border officials to release migrants from custody without court notices. Migrants were told they were required to check in with immigration officials in the United States.
“At the current operational pace, and without any additional measures such as Parole with Conditions, USBP would have over 45,000 individuals in custody by the end of the month. Further, the [U.S. Department of Homeland Security] Chief Medical Officer has concluded that ‘current conditions pose an increased risk of adverse health outcomes,’” the filing from the Department of Justice lawyers read.
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