In some respects, the numbers here in San Diego mirror statistics from border locations around the nation, and in other respects our totals are higher than national figures.
According to the Department of Homeland Security, our increase in border patrol apprehensions is even with the national increase. However, the ICE office here reports increases significantly higher here in deportations and returns.
As most readers know, a return is when someone at a border point turns around or in another way voluntarily declines to cross. Across the nation, returns and deportations rose 2 percent in fiscal 2016 over the previous fiscal year.
Here in San Diego, we deportations and returns surged 21 percent year over year, the Union-Tribune reports.
Homeland Security says migration demographics have shifted. Today, fewer Mexican nationals are coming across the nation’s southern border than were entering the U.S. 15 years ago, while families and unaccompanied children from Central America are coming to the U.S. in greater numbers. Central Americans frequently seek refugee status and are often here to escape grinding poverty and increasing violence back home, the Homeland Security report states.
While the Border Patrol’s national apprehensions topped 415,000 in fiscal 2016, the total was well below the all-time high established in 1986, when more than 618,000 were taken into custody.
As noted many times here in our blog, apprehensions often result in indefinite stays in detention centers.
An experienced San Diego immigrantion law attorney can help you deal with the complexities of paperwork, hearings and more.
