Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported 128,877 encounters with illegal immigrants between ports of entry in the month of February in Texas. This number is nearly even with January’s total number.

Acting CBP Commissioner Troy Miller credits the CBP One mobile application. He released a press release.

“The new border enforcement measures kept February’s overall encounter numbers nearly even with January,” said CBP Acting Commissioner Troy Miller. “We are also encouraged by the new functionality in the CBP One mobile application, which has provided migrants the ability to safely and easily schedule an appointment at a Port of Entry to request a humanitarian exception to the Title 42 public health order. The app cuts out the smugglers and decreases migrant exploitation. CBP continues to make improvements to the app to address feedback we have received from stakeholders.”

It should be noted that January and February’s numbers are the lowest since February 2021, the beginning of the Biden administration. The numbers are still way too high to be sustainable but let’s hope that this is the beginning of a downward trend of monthly totals.

In February 2023, there were 39,206 (25%) repeat encounters and 94,124 (61%) unique encounters on the southwest border. The number of unique individuals encountered in February 2023 was 94,124 compared to 107,959 in January 2023, a 13% decrease in the number of unique individuals encountered the prior month.

25% of encounters involved individuals who had at least one prior encounter in the previous 12 months, compared to an average one-year re-encounter rate of 14% for FY2014-2019.

CBP total encounters in February 2023 were 212,266, up approximately 2% from 208,511 in January 2023. This total includes Border Patrol encounters and includes noncitizens processed at Ports of Entry including individuals who sought an exception to the Title 42 public health order based on certain vulnerabilities and scheduled an appointment to present in advance via the CBP One mobile application.

More numbers from the CBP press release:

Over two-thirds (71.4%) of all southwest border encounters were single adults, with 110,722 encounters in February, a 1.5% increase compared to January.

72,591 encounters, 46.8% of the total, were processed for expulsion under Title 42. 82,407 encounters were processed under Title 8 immigration authorities.

65,178 encounters involving single adults (58.9% of all single adult encounters) were processed for expulsion under the Title 42 public health order, with 45,544 processed under Title 8 (41.1% of all single adult encounters).

7,215 encounters involving family unit individuals (21.7% of all family unit individuals) were processed for expulsion under the Title 42 public health order, with 25,976 processed under Title 8 (78.3% of all family unit individuals).

Though the Biden administration is trying to put an end to the use of Title 42 on the border, they are still using it. Whether or not they want to admit it, Title 42 has been an effective tool to deal with the Biden border crisis.

One disturbing increase reported is that of unaccompanied minors.

Encounters of unaccompanied children increased 16%, with 9,382 encounters in January compared with 10,870 in February. In February, the average number of unaccompanied children in CBP custody was 438 per day, compared with an average of 332 per day in January and 570 per day in December.

That is not good news at all. We know that unaccompanied minors are susceptible to human traffickers and they end up as child slave labor or abused by adult guardians. The number of family units has decreased though.

Encounters of family unit individuals decreased by 13% from 38,121 in January to 33,191 in February—which is a 62% decrease from the peak of 87,461 in August 2021.

The CBP report touts the effectiveness of the new policies put in place by the Biden administration for the lowered numbers. Just think if the administration had paid attention to the border from the beginning of their term in office. There likely would not have been the crisis we’ve seen since Biden took office. Biden discontinued almost all of the previous administration’s policies and agreements in securing the border and the result is the Biden border crisis. Now that Biden is facing re-election, he is changing course and at least pretending he is securing the border. He knows it will be a big campaign issue in 2024.

Texas is working 24/7 to secure the border as President Biden continues to ignore the crisis his open border policies created.

The Texas National Guard patrols around the clock to detect and stop illegal crossings, seize deadly drugs, and combat cartel activity. pic.twitter.com/gAzot3axE8

— Greg Abbott (@GregAbbott_TX) March 19, 2023