(Texas Scorecard) – The invasion at the southern border has skyrocketed under President Joe Biden, and voters recognize it as one of the top issues in the presidential election.
However, Reuters and other media outlets have pushed the claim that Biden is deporting more people than former President Donald Trump—a claim disputed by border security advocates.
In the five full fiscal years, FY 2016 to FY 2020, before Biden became president, Border Patrol agents at the Southwest border apprehended on average just over 472,300 illegal aliens annually, an average of about 39,360 per month.
However, on March 20, 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the CDC issued orders under Title 42 of the U.S. Code directing the expulsion of aliens who entered the United States illegally or appeared at the border ports without proper documents. Illegal border crossers who met the criteria under Title 42 were taken to the closest port of entry and sent back across the border.
Of the nearly 240,000 illegal aliens apprehended at the Southwest border between late March and the end of September 2020, 82.1 percent—more than 197,000 aliens—were expelled under Title 42. The remaining 45,000-plus were processed for removal under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).
Out of the fewer than 285,000 illegal aliens apprehended in the first four months of FY 2021 (ending on January 31), nearly 87 percent (247,000-plus) were expelled under Title 42.
In the 39 full months, February 2021 to May 2024, that Biden has been in office and CBP has published statistics, agents have apprehended just over 6.9 million illegal aliens at the U.S.-Mexico border, an average of more than 177,000 apprehensions per month.
According to the Center for Immigration Studies, “DHS can’t formally deport aliens until they’ve been ordered removed, however, which in most cases requires the issuance of a removal order by an immigration judge at DOJ, following the completion of often-lengthy removal proceedings under section 240 of the INA. Border removals, however, can be an exception to that ‘immigration judge removal order’ rule. That’s because in section 235(b) of the INA, Congress gave Border Patrol agents the power to subject illegal migrants to what’s known as ‘expedited removal’ — a procedure under which those agents, and not immigration judges, are allowed to issue removal orders themselves.”
Recidivism is another statistic that is no longer talked about. Unlike deportations under removal orders (section 240 or expedited)—no real penalties prevent expelled aliens from turning around and entering illegally again, meaning those expulsions had no “deterrent effect.” Biden’s CBP stopped publishing recidivism numbers in FY 2021.
According to Andrew R. Arthur from the Center for Immigration Studies, “DHS has released at least 88.5 percent of all of the aliens CBP encountered at the borders and the ports under the Biden administration.”
In the first eight months of FY 2024, border patrol reports it placed more than 31,000 aliens encountered at the border on “Northern Triangle Repatriation Flights,” while fewer than 187,000 aliens were sent to Southwest border ports of entry. Some of those aliens may have been subject to expedited removal, while others may have been simple returns, there’s no way to determine which is which.
From figures produced by the DHS Office of Homeland Security Statistics (OHSS), in the first five months of FY 2024 (October 2023 through the end of February), DHS removed 135,500 aliens—an average of 27,100 per month.
Compare that to FY 2019, under Trump, when DHS removed more than 347,000 aliens, an average of 28,940 per month, and FY 2018, when DHS removed 327,260 aliens (an average of 27,272 per month)—all in years in which the number of illegal entrants subject to the much simpler expedited removal process was significantly lower.
When Donald Trump was president, illegal aliens were actively being sent back to Mexico through Title 42 and INA, among other Trump-era policies that enforced border security at the Southwestern border. By contrast, Biden has neglected to enforce border laws.