Posted on August 9, 2021

Border Patrol Picks up 834 Migrant Children Illegally Sent Across Border in One Day, a Record

Anna Giaritelli, Washington Examiner, August 6, 2021

The Border Patrol picked up a record number of unaccompanied children illegally sent into the United States from Mexico on Wednesday, a sign the border crisis is worsening.

Federal data released Thursday evening said that 834 children were encountered by federal agents on the southern border the day before. Each child was alone and without a parent or guardian, according to a fact sheet shared by the Departments of Homeland Security and the Department of Health and Human Services.

“Biden’s open border policy is a disaster,” Sen. Tom Cotton, an Arkansas Republican, tweeted in reaction to the news.

That 834 children came across the border in a single day at the height of summer, when it is most dangerous to travel outside amid triple-digit temperatures in southern border states. The phenomenon indicates that the surge in people coming to the U.S. is not a seasonal influx, as President Joe Biden had claimed earlier this year.

Historically, more people attempt to sneak into the country during the spring, before temperatures peak. That the number of migrants encountered along the border has risen through the summer indicates that there are other factors leading them to make the crossing {snip}

{snip} Biden announced early on that the DHS would no longer immediately turn away children, as had been the policy since Trump imposed the public health measure in March 2020.

The number of children taken into custody by U.S. border officials has soared since the start of the year, from 5,851 in January, which is equivalent to 189 per day, to more than 9,405 in February, according to Customs and Border Protection data. In March, 18,877 children came over, surpassing the previous record of 11,861 in May 2019. {snip}

Preliminary government data indicates the U.S. will exceed the 19,000 mark for single children taken into custody in July {snip}

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