by Jennie Taer
Illegal migrant encounters at the southern border increased in August, despite the Biden administration’s claims that it is controlling the situation, according to The Washington Post.
Illegal migrant encounters increased to more than 177,000 in August at the southern border after surging to roughly 132,000 in July, the Post reported. Meanwhile, the Biden administration has repeatedly asserted that the situation is improving, and that the flow of migrants into the country is being stopped.
“We are stopping the flow at the border. If anything, what the president has been able to do on his own, without the help of Republicans in Congress, something that he had to do on his own again, because Republicans refuse to give the funding necessary to deal with the situation, a broken immigration system that has been broken for decades […],” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Wednesday.
The Biden administration also oversaw the southern border when federal authorities recorded the highest number of illegal migrant encounters in history in fiscal year 2022.
Jean-Pierre doubled down while touting the administration’s expansion of legal routes for migrants to enter Thursday, saying “The president has done more to secure the border, to deal with this issue of immigration, than anybody else.”
The press secretary referenced a short decrease in illegal migrant encounters in the month of June, when Border Patrol recorded roughly 99,000 illegal migrant encounters. That same month, federal authorities saw a record number of migrants entering through ports along the southern border using CBP One, a phone application the Biden administration allows migrants to use to book entry appointments.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) defended the latest data as a normal trend, according to the Post.
“But as with every year, the U.S. is seeing ebbs and flows of migrants arriving fueled by seasonal trends and the efforts of smugglers to use disinformation to prey on vulnerable migrants and encourage migration,” agency spokesperson Erin Heeter told the Post.
Neither the White House nor DHS responded to requests for comment.
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Jennie Taer is a reporter at Daily Caller News Foundation.
Photo “Illegal Immigrants” by John Modlin.
