Border Patrol: 177 percent jump in unaccompanied minors at Mexico-US border
Sep 24, 2015, 2:35 PM
(AP Photo)
(AP Photo)
PHOENIX — Data from U.S. Customs and Border Protection released this week showed a large increase in the apprehension of unaccompanied children and families at the Arizona-Mexico border.
While overall apprehensions of unaccompanied children fell 46 percent on the Southwest border, the Yuma Sector experienced a 177 percent increase — the largest increase reported by the nine sectors of the Southwest border. The sector includes Arizona’s Yuma, La Paz and Mojave counties.
Likewise, while the Southwest Border reported an overall decrease in apprehensions of family units of 46 percent, the Yuma Sector reported a 130 percent increase, the second-highest increase reported from the nine border sectors.
Over 35,000 unaccompanied children were reportedly apprehended in fiscal year 2015, according to the data.
The data compared apprehensions between October 2014 and August 2015 to apprehensions reported during the same time period last year.
The numbers are, “surprising uptick” and a “concern” for the administration, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said, as reported by the Associated Press.
Last year, thousands of children poured across the border into the United States, especially Texas. Hundreds of the unaccompanied minors were taken to a facility in Nogales, Arizona, where they slept in a large Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility.
A lot of the children came from Central America to seek asylum.
