Report: CBP data shows number of migrant detentions hits 15-year high

April 3, 2021 KT1 US 0

Young minors talk to an agent outside at a pod in the Donna Department of Homeland Security holding facility, the main detention center for unaccompanied children in the Rio Grande Valley run by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), in Donna, Texas, Tuesday, March 30, 2021. The minors are housed by the hundreds in eight pods that are about 3,200 square feet in size. Many of the pods had more than 500 children in them. The Biden administration on Tuesday for the first time allowed journalists inside its main detention facility at the border for migrant children, revealing a severely overcrowded tent structure where more than 4,000 kids and families were crammed into pods and the youngest kept in a large play pen with mats on the floor for sleeping. (AP Photo/Dario Lopez-Mills, Pool)

Young minors spoke to an agent outside at a pod in the Donna Department of Homeland Security holding facility, the main detention center for unaccompanied children in the Rio Grande Valley run by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), in Donna, Texas, Tuesday, March 30, 2021. (AP Photo/Dario Lopez-Mills, Pool)

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UPDATED 7:10 AM PT – Saturday, April 3, 2021

A new report shows migrant apprehensions at the U.S.-Mexico border has reached a 15-year high.

According to preliminary data published by Customs and Border Protection on Friday, more than 170,000 border crossings were recorded in March. This marked a major uptick from the 78,000 crossings documented in January.

“You see the consequences of Joe Biden’s failed policies. We may be facing, very soon, 250,000 migrants crossing our border every month.” @SenTomCotton pic.twitter.com/cVPFjWA7dd

— Senate Republicans (@SenateGOP) April 1, 2021

The data also shows more than 18,000 minors were apprehended at the border, which is a 60 percent increase from the previous record in May 2019.

This came as the Biden administration struggles to stem the flow of illegal immigration at the southern border, leading to migrant children being held at temporary facilities far longer than the law allows.

During an interview with Breitbart, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) shared his take on the crisis. Cotton said the illegal immigrants he talked to admitted their asylum claims were illegitimate and part of a plan to exploit economic benefits in the U.S.

WASHINGTON, DC - AUGUST 2: (AFP OUT) Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) makes an announcement on the introduction of the Reforming American Immigration for a Strong Economy (RAISE) Act in the Roosevelt Room at the White House on August 2, 2017 in Washington, DC. The act aims to overhaul U.S. immigration by moving towards a "merit-based" system. (Photo by Zach Gibson - Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON, DC – AUGUST 2: (AFP OUT) Sen. Tom Cotton made an announcement at the White House on August 2, 2017 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Zach Gibson – Pool/Getty Images)

“I talked to so many of these migrants, you know, on the side, they did the dog and pony show with a bunch of other senators. I grabbed a border patrol officer who spoke Spanish. We went, we just talked to some of them sitting on the benches waiting to be processed I said, ‘where are you from? How long did it take you to get here? Why did you come?’ And to a person they said, ‘I came to get a job,’ or, ‘I came to get together with my husband or my wife or my boyfriend or girlfriend who’s here and has a job.’ Not a single person claimed a genuine claim of asylum,” Cotton explained.

Cotton went on to criticize the Biden administration for preaching an open border message to migrants, filling them with false hope.

“There’s nothing moral and there’s nothing virtuous about Joe Biden’s rhetoric and policies that have induced these young women and these young children to make a very dangerous journey across almost 2,000 miles of Mexico to get our border on the hope that they will be admitted into our country and given legal status permanently,” Cotton said. “That’s simply not the case.”

In the meantime, GOP lawmakers are pushing for a congressional hearing on the crisis at the southern border, to have officials from the White House testify over their handling of the situation.