Biden admin sees progress in tackling border crisis as March’s numbers down from last year

The Biden administration is tying relatively lower numbers at the southern border encountered in March to measures it rolled out earlier this year to tackle the crisis.

Specifically, Border Patrol encounters of migrants along the southwest border entering illegally between ports of entry – 162,317 in March 2023 – are down 23% from March 2022 (211,181) and 4% from March 2021 (169,216). An administration official also noted that the increase in Border Patrol encounters between February and March is lower (25%) than the prior two years (33% and 73% for 2022 and 2021.)  Adam Shaw is a politics reporter for Fox News Digital, primarily covering immigration and border security.

The administration has pointed to measures introduced in January that expanded Title 42 expulsions to include Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Cubans and Haitians – four nationalities whose encounters had spiked in the prior months. The measures, which were followed by a sharp drop in encounters from a record high in December, also included a humanitarian parole program that allows for up to 30,000 of those nationalities to fly into the U.S. each month if they have not entered illegally and meet certain other criteria including background checks and having a sponsor. In March, 27,783 migrants of those four nationalities were paroled into the U.S. He can be reached at adam.shaw2@fox.com or on Twitter.