The Associated Press reported on Tuesday that the number of people caught illegally crossing the border, into the United States from Mexico, has significantly plunged in last month. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly reported that fewer than 12,500 people have been arrested trying to enter the U.S. in March, a decrease of about 70 percent from the more than 43,000 people arrested in February.
“It’s hard to know what is going on. We have one data set [February apprehension numbers] and maybe another [March apprehension numbers] are insufficient, particularly when we have questions about how that’s reported to us, not about how they collect data — we have no reason to believe that’s shifting,” said Michelle Lujan Grisham (D-N.M.).
Michelle Lujan Grisham, the Chairwoman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, decries the administration’s immigration policies, in spite of the drop in apprehensions, and maintains that Democrats will take the administration’s numbers with a grain of salt.
“Do I think the administration has created such panic, fear and alarm that people are unwilling to reunite with their families or think twice about that they’re going to be immediately detained or mothers would be separated from their children?” she said. “I’m a mother, I would think twice about that.”
Trump campaigned on cracking down on immigration enforcement and increasing the number of deportations of undocumented immigrants. In just the first couple of months of his presidency, he has already stepped up the arrests of immigrants living in the U.S. illegally, as well as authorized the construction of a wall. The bidding period for the administration’s first request for contractor’s proposals to build the wall closed midnight on Wednesday.
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