We Must Secure The Border And Build The Wall To Make America Safe Again

Walls Work. When it comes to stopping drugs and illegal aliens across our borders, border walls have proven to be extremely effective. Border security relies on a combination of border infrastructure, technology, personnel and partnerships with law enforcement at the state, local, tribal, and federal level.

• U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) apprehends over 1,100 people a day crossing the border illegally. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) refuses entry to 7 known or suspected terrorists every day, 50 every week, and 2,500 every year.
• DHS has seen a 300 percent increase in unaccompanied alien children (UACs) in the last eight months of 2017 – and a 600 percent increase in family units.
• In Fiscal Year 2017, Border Patrol saw a 73 percent increase in assaults on officers along the Southwest border.
• Thousands of aliens illegally re-enter the United States each year, with approximately 15,700 sentenced for illegal reentry in fiscal year 2016. This does not even include the many thousands more who evade detection, or those who are not charged with illegal reentry as part of a plea agreement.
• The border jurisdictions bear the brunt of illegal alien crime, which is a large portion of the total crime in the United States. Of the 53,908 criminal cases filed by federal prosecutors in the 94 U.S. District Courts in fiscal year 2016, 23,573 cases (43.7 percent) were located in just the five border districts (Arizona, Southern District of California, New Mexico, Southern District of Texas, and Western District of Texas). In the five border districts, noncitizens accounted for 73.5 percent of all federal offenders sentenced for felonies or Class A misdemeanors in fiscal year 2016, and 47 percent of all federal non-immigration felonies or Class A misdemeanors.
• Half of all federal criminal cases filed in U.S. District Courts in fiscal year 2016 (25,965 of 53,908 cases) were referred by the Department of Homeland Security.
• Simply put—walls work. They have worked in Yuma, Arizona as a result of the 2006 Bipartisan Secure Border Act. They have also worked in San Diego. Both areas have seen 95 percent drops in attempted illegal border crossings.
• Only 3.5 percent of UACs apprehended are eventually removed from the United States.

Illegal immigrants are incentivized to illegally enter by the low standard for credible fear and the lack of cost or sanction for filing a baseless asylum claim, which allows many of them to assert meritless claims that will not be adjudicated for years.

• There has been a 1,700 percent increase in Credible Fear receipts from 2008 to 2016.
• Annual asylum applications have tripled in the last 3 years.
• There has been a 1,750 percent increase in the asylum backlog over the last 5 years. The affirmative asylum backlog at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has grown to 313,214 cases, as of January 28th. Another 290,000 asylum cases are pending in our immigration courts as of February 9.
• The increase in claims filed is not associated with an increase in meritorious claims. As of FY 17, the asylum grant rate for defensive applications in immigration court is approximately 30%. On average, out of 88 claims that pass the credible fear screening, fewer than 13 will ultimately result in a grant of asylum.
• The backlog of cases in our immigrations courts is approximately 675,000 cases.