CBP Reports 11 Consecutive Months of Zero Releases at the Border

U.S. Border Patrol recorded its 11th straight month of zero releases at the southern border in March, according to a statement by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) on April 9.

“The sustained decline in illegal border crossings and apprehensions—now at levels not seen in over three decades—shows the impact of robust enforcement policies,” the statement reads.

“With daily apprehensions down 95 percent from the previous administration and 14 consecutive months of fewer than 9,000 southwest border apprehensions, the border remains more secure than at any point in history.”

Apprehensions along the southwest border in March were lower by 90 percent from the monthly average of the past 33 years. From the peak under the previous administration in December 2023, apprehensions are down 97 percent.

The number of apprehensions per day last month was fewer than the apprehensions made in a single hour during the peak in December 2023, when 336 people were taken into custody per hour.

CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott attributed the successful protection of the border to “America First” policies and a unified federal effort backed by infrastructure, technology, and personnel.

“Under President Trump and Secretary Mullin, we’re building on what works, refining our approach, and locking in real border security. This isn’t temporary—it’s the new normal,” Scott said, referring to Department of Homeland (DHS) Secretary Markwayne Mullin.

The March numbers are a continuation of the intense crackdown on illegal immigrants in the first year of the Trump administration’s second term.

In 2025, Border Patrol apprehended 90,084 individuals along the southwest border, DHS said in a Jan. 20 statement.

This was significantly fewer than the 155,485 apprehensions recorded in an average month under the previous administration. Apprehensions by Border Patrol last year were the “lowest ever recorded in CBP history,” the department said.

In addition to border apprehensions, nearly 3 million illegal immigrants left the United States in 2025, which included approximately 2.2 million self-deportations and more than 675,000 deportations.

Immigration Enforcement Funding

The Trump administration’s immigration policies face ongoing scrutiny from Democrats.

Last month, two Democratic lawmakers joined Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) in calling on the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) to conduct an investigation into what they called Trump’s “violent escalation of federal immigration enforcement,” according to a March 4 statement from the office of Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.).

In a letter to the CBO director, dated Feb. 25, the lawmakers raised concerns about the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which set aside roughly $75 billion for ICE and around $65 billion for CBP.

The lawmakers argued that the sums were a “dramatic expansion” of these agencies’ annual budgets, and yet there was no comprehensive public accounting for how these funds would be spent.

“This lack of transparency is part of a broader pattern in which the Trump administration has expanded domestic security operations while withholding basic cost information from Congress,” the letter reads.

“We have serious concerns that this pattern reflects an increasingly authoritarian and unchecked approach to executive power. Congress has a responsibility to ensure that federal agencies are not using taxpayer dollars in ways that vitiate Americans’ civil rights or expand executive overreach.”

DHS praised the One Big Beautiful Bill Act when it was signed into law by President Donald Trump in July, calling it a “historic win” for the rule of law and for the American people, according to a July 4 statement from the department.

Then-DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said the funding from the bill would allow ICE to hire 10,000 new agents, allowing annual deportation rates to reach as high as 1 million.

The funding provided to DHS under the bill will help the department “further deliver on President Trump’s mandate to arrest and deport criminal illegal aliens and MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN!” Noem said in a statement at the time.

Drug Seizures

Meanwhile, the April 9 statement from CBP also notes that the agency remains at the frontlines against drug smuggling activities, seizing narcotics before they hit American communities.

Last month, CBP seized more than 65,000 pounds of drugs nationwide, up by 27 percent from March 2024.

On April 9, DHS announced that U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Escanaba had seized 4,510 pounds of cocaine, worth around $33.9 million, in a single interdiction on Easter Sunday while conducting a patrol in the Eastern Pacific Ocean.

Mullin said Operation Pacific Viper, launched in August 2025, is a central part of the Trump administration’s fight against cartels at sea.

“This operation has already seized over 215,000 pounds of cocaine and has arrested over 160 suspected narco-traffickers,” the DHS secretary said in a statement.