Southwest border apprehensions more than doubled in 2019, apprehensions driven by increase in families Apprehensions at U.S-Mexico border, by fiscal year and type 800 thousand
The number of migrant apprehensions at the U.S.-Mexico border rose in fiscal 2019 to its highest annual level in 12 years. The 851,508 apprehensions recorded last fiscal year (October 2018-September 2019) were more than double the number the year before (396,579) but still well short of the levels in the early 2000s, according to CBP, the agency tasked with enforcing immigration laws at the border.
The increase in apprehensions has come as a growing number of migrants seek asylum. The demographic profile of those crossing the border has changed, too: People traveling in families, not single adults, accounted for the majority of those apprehended last year (56%). And most of those apprehended were from the Northern Triangle countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, which have struggled with violence and a lack of economic opportunities. That represents a notable break from the 2000s and early 2010s, when Mexicans accounted for the vast majority of those apprehended.
Southwest border apprehensions more  | than doubled in 2019, apprehensions driven by  | increase in families  | Apprehensions at U.S-Mexico border, by fiscal  | year and type  | 852  | 800 thousand  | 302 Single adults  | 600  | Unaccompanied  | 76  | minors  | 400  | 474 Family units  | 200  | 13  | '14  | 18  | 15  | 16  | '17  | 19  | Note: a Family units refers to the number of people traveling  | in families.  | Source: U.S. Customs and Border Protection.  | PEW RESEARCH CENTER 