Fiscal Year 2024 has gotten started with a bang along the border. Not only are tens of thousands of illegals regularly being apprehended after crossing over, the great unknown number of “got-aways” is estimated to have reached 18,000 during the FY’s first 16 days.
Got-aways are notoriously difficult to estimate for obvious reasons: they and their coyote guides go to great lengths to get across undetected and, especially, unarrested. Some are spotted by electronic surveillance, but otherwise the number can only be guessed at by the tracks they leave behind, which can only be found by patrolling agents. With pre-release “processing” of illegals already in custody occupying most of the agency’s manpower, the CBP has far too few agents to look for many such clues, so the estimate is always a guess, and often a low one.
To make matters worse, officials know that persons of “special interest” are being identified more and more among illegals who are encountered, so the CBP suspects those of special interest are likely to be even more common among those trying hard to evade authorities.
At any rate, even if 18,000 is a decent estimate, that means more than 1,000 got-aways are coming over every day. How many are terrorists? We have no way of knowing. Let’s hope we don’t find out the hard way.
For more, see Breitbart News.