Biden Administration to Release 400 Migrant Families per Day by June

The Biden administration anticipates that it will be releasing 400 migrant families into the country a day by mid-June as the influx of people encountered illegally crossing the border overwhelms its detention capacity, according to a government planning document.

The 400 figure is eight times greater than the 50 families that Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement were releasing from its facilities each day early on in 2021. As of mid-March, Border Patrol agents were seeing 500 people arrive as part of a family group per day.

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Only the head of family is enrolled in ICE’s programs that track people after they are released or paroled into the country, so the total number of migrants released is at least two times higher than the 400 figure because each family has at least two people.

In the final months of 2020, the number of people who were intercepted at the border hovered around 75,000 per month. By February, the first full month that President Joe Biden was in office, that monthly number had grown to more than 100,000. In March, the number of families, adults, and single children showing up at the border spiked to 172,000.

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{snip} After taking office, Biden ordered the Border Patrol no longer to turn away single children immediately who cross the border alone. At the same time, the Mexican state of Tamaulipas blocked the U.S. from returning families as the U.S. had been doing since March 2020 in an effort to avoid detaining people during the pandemic. {snip}

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The dramatic increase in releases of families within the U.S. is not expected to affect any specific region or city. For example, those who come across the border in South Texas will likely be transferred to regional ICE facilities in Karnes County or hotels across Texas, then allowed to travel anywhere in the country.

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