More than 240,000 people were apprehended illegally crossing the border in October, the highest on record for the month of October in recorded history.
The number does not include gotaways, which U.S. Customs and Border Protection does not publicly release but The Center Square exclusively obtains from a border agent. The October number is likely to rise significantly when the gotaway data becomes available. Gotaways is the official CBP term for those who illegally entered between ports of entry, intentionally sought to evade capture, and don’t return to Mexico.
U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has blamed the previous administration for inheriting a broken immigration system, but his and the Biden administration's policies led to more than 10 million illegal border crossers since January 2021, critics argue. Calls for Mayorkas' impeachment have escalated as new record numbers of illegal border crossers are reported each month.
In October, there were 240,988 total southwest border encounters, according to CBP data. Also last month, CBP officials processed for entry into the U.S. over 44,000 people using the CBP One App. The mobile app, CBP says, “remains a key component of DHS’s efforts to incentivize noncitizens to use lawful, safe, and orderly pathways and disincentivize attempts to cross between ports of entry.”
