US Border Patrol is taking into custody more non-Mexicans than Mexicans for the second time in a three-year period on the south-west border. This is a sign of the renewed surge of undocumented immigrants from Central America, trying to flee to the US to escape the gang warfare and violence in their own nations.
Many of those apprehended are unaccompanied undocumented immigrant minors or family units coming from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador, new US Customs and Border Enforcement statistics suggest. Almost two-thirds of the border apprehensions took place in the Rio Grande Valley Border Patrol Sector, which spans much of the southernmost tip of Texas.
There were 368,411 undocumented immigrants apprehended on the border between the US and Mexico in August this year, over half of which were not Mexicans. By July this year, 57,344 immigrants from El Salvador, 58,337 immigrants from Guatemala, and 41,042 from Honduras had been apprehended by Border Patrol. This compares to just 160,193 Mexican immigrants.
Two years ago, the number of non-Mexicans apprehended outstripped that of Mexicans, according to Pew Research Center analysis. Washington-based Migration Policy Institute policy analyst, Faye Hipsman, says that the trend shows no sign of fading. 2014 was marked by a massive surge of undocumented immigrants from Central America, resulting in a humanitarian crisis, but Hipsman notes that because the element of surprise has gone, US Border Patrol is now more ready to handle such crises.