Border apprehensions increased in 2018 – especially for migrant families

There were nearly 416,000 apprehensions at the U.S.-Mexico border in the first 11 months of 2018, the most in any January-November period since 2014, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of the most recent available data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The increase was driven in part by a dramatic spike in border apprehensions of family members in the fall of last year.

Despite the increase, the number of border apprehensions through the first 11 months of 2018 remained far below the levels throughout most of the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s, when around 1 million or more migrants were being apprehended each fiscal year.

The situation at the Southwest border has become the focus of a partial federal government shutdown, now in its third week. President Donald Trump and Democratic congressional leaders are at an impasse over Trump’s proposal for a wall at the border.

KJ