Q&A of the Day – Illegal Border Crossings by State 

Today’s entry: Q&A of the Day – Illegal Border Crossings by State 

Bottom Line: It’s a great question. Obviously, when talking about our southern border we have four border states. Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas. Seemingly all of the conversation surrounds two – Arizona and Texas. And with good reason. They share the two largest borders with Mexico, including the Texas border with Mexico being larger than the other three states combined. Everything in Texas is bigger, starting with their southern border. But what’s also interesting is the dynamic involved in these three states. Two traditional blue states which are inclined towards sanctuary type policies, California and New Mexico, with two traditional red states which are anything but sanctuary states in Arizona and Texas. In discussing the record 2.494 million border crossers detected by Border Patrol over the past year, seldom does the border context of where they’re crossing come up – save the hottest and most often easy to cross spots in Texas. But we do have the numbers.  

Border patrol is broken up into sectors with various regions where they have official operations. This is to say that they don’t provide state specific information but do have numbers by sectors which we can aggregate within the given states to get a picture of just what it looks like. Here’s the breakdown by state this year: 

• Arizona: 24% 
• California: 11% 
• New Mexico: N/A 
• Texas: 58% 

New Mexico’s border is small enough it lacks its own sector, and its numbers are wrapped into a combination of Arizona’s and California’s. So those three states account for just over 93% of all encounters with those lacking status entering the country over the past year. As for the remaining 7%? Those are the ones coming by sea which includes Florida’s total as well. In discussing why border crossing numbers are the way there are, come two key considerations aside from the size of the border of states like California, New Mexico and much of Arizona. The terrain. The only thing less hospitable than attempting to cross vast mountain ranges to approach our southern border is to do so in desert mountain ranges. It’s not a mistake that the two most commonly accessed areas, by a wide margin, are the Rio Grande Valley and Del Rio Valley in Texas. Not only are they in Valleys, which are far easier to access, but there are vast water systems and more hospitable conditions than much of the rest of the border as well. Once upon a time we saw somewhat different distribution of border crossers based on where they were desirous of going. That’s why for example, in previous times, you heard more about California crossings than you do now.  

The Biden administration's effectively open border policy, complete with relocation services for border crossers based often on the preference of where they’d like to go, has meant the game for asylum seekers is to simply get across wherever its easiest as opposed to more strategic geographical crossings. That’s why you now have 82% of illegal border crossings coming in two red states with governors who don’t adhere to sanctuary policies. It’s also why they’ve attempted to do what they can at the state level to combat the free flow of illegal immigrants and its why they continue to ship them to sanctuary states and cities.  

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