The number of immigrants arrested or turned away at the U.S. border with Mexico has climbed rapidly in 2019 compared to recent years, according to Department of Homeland Security data. The figures, obtained by Axios, show that attempted border crossings so far this year have reached levels not seen for around a decade. The number of border-crossers usually begins to grow around March due to the warmer weather and tends to peak around May. However, in just three weeks of March, there have already been almost 66,000 apprehensions and people dubbed “inadmissible.” That’s reportedly around the same level as at the peak of the child-migrant crisis under President Obama in May 2014. A DHS official told Axios that the surge has been driven by an influx of migrant families and unaccompanied children.
