An unprecedented number of Indian immigrants are entering the US via its southern border, new federal statistics have revealed – with 42,000 intercepted in the past year alone.
The number, unveiled last month by US Customs and Border Protection, is more than double the amount from the same period the year prior – when crossings by Indians were already at a record high.
What’s more, an additional 1,600 have crossed from the northern border amid the rising phenomenon – four times the amount of the past three years combined.
Nearly all turn themselves in to Border Patrol – who then process them as asylum-seekers due to recent unrest surrounding India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
Since 2007, the total number of annual illegal border crossings from India only exceeded 5,000 four times.
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An unprecedented number of Indian immigrants are entering the US via its southern border, new federal statistics have revealed – with 42,000 intercepted in the past year alone
CBP’s total encounters along the border this past year were more than 2million, meaning migrants from India represented just under 2 percent of that sample set
A litany of other factors, political and socioeconomic included, has since spurred the sizable jump – which has also been bolstered by records from other demographics.
CBP’s total encounters along the border this past year were more than 2million, meaning migrants from India represented just under 2 percent of that sample set.
The total, pertaining to the fiscal year starting last October, includes roughly 210,000 apprehensions this past month alone – the highest recorded in all of 2023.
The record monthly figure brought the total number of migrant encounters for fiscal year – for the fist time ever in history – to 2.48 million, up from 2.38 million in 2022.
At the time, the 2.38millon had been a world record, but has since been bested as asylum-seekers like Sikh supporter Arshdeep Singh continue to enter the country.
Singh, a 23-year-old from Punjab who spoke to The Wall Street Journal Sunday about his journey to the States, spent 40 days this summer migrating to the US.
Rather than being arrested while evading capture, he turned himself in to ask for asylum – a request he was granted before arriving in SoCal’s Fresno.
He recalled to the paper how was threatened by men he believed were affiliated with India’s ruling, Hindu-centered party, before his father made arrangements for him to leave – adding onto the current humanitarian crisis at the border.
But ‘the path here turned out to be just as dangerous as it had been for me to stay in Punjab,’ the young man said – before describing the roundabout way he made it into the country.
In one clip recorded late last month, more than a dozen men who appeared to be Indian were filmed illegally entering the US at an unspecified point along the southern border, chanting Hindu religious slogans like ‘Jai Shri Ram’, and ‘Jai Bajrang bali’
Other similar clips over the past year show much of the same- showing the increasing number of Indians flocking to the US amid political discourse in their own country
The number, unveiled last month by US Customs and Border Protection, is more than double the amount from the same period the year prior – when crossings by Indians were already at a record high
What’s more, an additional 1,600 have crossed from the northern border amid the rising phenomenon – four times the amount of the last three years combined
Nearly all turn themselves in to Border Patrol – who then process them as asylum-seekers due to recent unrest surrounding India ‘s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
nationalist policies put in place by the country’s pro-Hindu prime minister are to blame for the recent hike in numbers.
That, along with success stories from those who have already made the trip – now rife on social media – have fueled the charge, with footage surfacing almost every day showing men and women undergoing different journeys to make it to America
Migrants can be arriving in the Tucson sector of Arizona. The daily number of crossers here can exceed 2,000 people, including people from all around the world
First, flying from New Delhi to Hungary – where he was kept in a small room for 10 days and fed only bread and water – he then flew to France, and then Mexico City, where he was kept in a room for another week.
Afterward, he took another flight followed by a bus ride, eventually hitching his way to the US border, he said.
He proceeded to cross into California, where he was then taken to a processing center where he saw several others who had undergone a similar journey from India.
At that point, he and several others were allowed in virtually without question – thanks to nationalist policies put in place by Prime Minister Narendra Modi that experts say are to blame for the recent hike in numbers.
Modi’s Hindu-first policies, an associate of his recently told the New York Times, come as a calculated attempt to ‘convert all of India into believers of Hinduism.’
That, along with success stories from those who have already made the trip – now rife on social media – have fueled the charge, with footage surfacing almost every day showing men and women undergoing different journeys to make it to America.
In one clip recorded late last month, more than a dozen men who appeared to be Indian were filmed illegally entering the US at an unspecified point along the southern border, chanting Hindu religious slogans like ‘Jai Shri Ram’, and ‘Jai Bajrang bali.’
CBP’s total encounters along the border this past year were more than two million, meaning migrants from India represented just under 2 percent of that sample set
In one clip recorded late last month, more than a dozen men who appeared to be Indian were filmed illegally entering the US at an unspecified point along the southern border, chanting Hindu religious slogans like ‘Jai Shri Ram’, and ‘Jai Bajrang bali
The record monthly figure brought the total number of migrant encounters for fiscal year – for the fist time ever in history – to 2.48 million, up from 2.38 million in 2022
At the time, the 2.38millon had been a world record, but has since been bested as asylum-seekers continue to enter the country
India’s Hindu-first policies, an associate of prime minister Narendra Modi recently told the New York Times, is part of a calculated attempt to ‘convert all of India into believers of Hinduism’
In another clip recorded somewhere deep from the jungles of Panama, a parade of presumably Indian as seen traversing a stretch of the Darien Gap, a dayslong trek across the rugged Colombia-Panama border.
The crossing was once so dangerous that few dared to attempt it, but, given the current scale of the migrant crisis, today many migrants flood through its dense jungles to somehow make their way to and through Mexico.
Crossings of the Darien Gap – 66 roadless miles of dense, mountainous jungle and swamp filled with armed guerillas and drug traffickers in Panama – have shot up so much they could approach 500,000 people this year alone.
The migratory highway, similar to the miles of freight trains winding through Mexico, is one of several methods being exploited by groups including Indians, including smugglers who masquerade as travel agents to get US access – and it’s not always from the South.
This past April, four Indians were found dead close to the U.S-Canada border after trying to cross illegally when their boat capsized and killed them all.
Last year in January, four Indians similarly froze to death in Canada’s Manitoba near the U.S border.
Later in April, American officials rescued six Indians from Saint Regis River after receiving a report about a sinking boat near the southern border, barely saving all onboard.
Last August, seven more Indians were apprehended by the authorities who were trying to cross over to the US from Quebec.
The surge in migrants attempting to enter the US underscores the scale of the humanitarian crisis at the border, and the political challenge it presents for President Joe Biden
All have contributed to the spike in illegal Indian movements that have been reported for the most part since October of last year.
As border crossings continue to rise, administration officials have blamed migration from places like India and others set outside the Western Hemisphere on the US’s failure to logistically address the parade of illegal entries at the southern border.
Worsening matters is the US’s lack of relationships with those countries – making a cap on immigration very difficult to enforce, and also very costly.
The surge in migrants, meanwhile, underscores the scale of the humanitarian crisis at the border, and the political challenge it presents for President Joe Biden as he seeks re-election in 2024.
As it stands, the CPB ‘will continue to remain vigilant, making operational adjustments as necessary and enforcing consequences under US immigration law,’ said Troy A. Miller, the acting CBP commissioner, in a statement last week.
That said, the new data also shows how Venezuelans became the largest nationality arrested for illegally crossing the US border last month – replacing Mexicans for the first time on record.
Miller has called the scale of migration ‘historic’ and said CBP was working with domestic and foreign partners to address the issue and step up enforcement.
The Biden administration has also proposed about $14 billion for the border in a $106 billion spending package – announced last week – and has insisted that any long-term solution requires help from Congress.
The White House proposal includes $1.6 billion to hire 1,600 new asylum officers and processing personnel, which could double the number of people working on asylum cases.
It further suggests some $1.4 billion of the sum be used to add 375 immigration judges and their teams in addition to money for 1,300 new border patrol agents.
The crisis, meanwhile, remains ongoing.