(NewsNation) — For the first time ever, the total number of migrant encounters at the southern border has surpassed 2 million in a single fiscal year, according to new data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
Border Patrol agents encountered more than 203,000 migrants in August alone, per the latest figures released Monday.
That brings the total number of migrant encounters at the southern border to a record 2,150,639 for the fiscal year 2022 — almost 25% more than last year’s total — and there’s still one month left in the fiscal year.
As recently as fiscal year 2020, there were fewer than 500,000 migrant encounters at the southern border.
More than 55,000 migrants encountered at the southern border last month came from three countries, CBP noted.
“Failing communist regimes in Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba are driving a new wave of migration across the Western Hemisphere, including the recent increase in encounters at the southwest U.S. border,” CBP Commissioner Chris Magnus said in a statement.
The inflow from those three countries marks a 175% increase from the same time last year.
CPB noted that while crossings at the southern border are at an all-time high, the number of people originally from Mexico and northern Central America has decreased for the third consecutive month and even fallen 43% from August 2021.
Nearly 70% of all southwest border encounters last month were single adults and about one in five involved people who had at least one prior encounter in the previous year, CBP found.
The latest figures suggest the crisis at the southern border has not meaningfully improved in recent months.
Officials in nearby border towns say they are overwhelmed by the influx of new arrivals. That reality has led three Republican governors — Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, Flordia Gov. Ron Desantis and Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey — to implement a migrant relocation strategy that has drawn fierce backlash from Democratic mayors on the receiving end of one-way tickets.