Border crossings in 2016 to 2020

1. A volatile five‑year arc: numbers don’t tell a single story

From 2016 through 2020 the raw figures moved dramatically: 2016 recorded roughly 415,816 Border Patrol apprehensions, 2019 saw a large surge to about 859,501, and 2020 registered about 405,036 encounters — but 2020’s total reflects a counting change when Title 42 expulsions were added to routine Title 8 apprehensions beginning in March 2020 ^[1]. That mix of factors — migration drivers, enforcement policy and a pandemic-era public‑health order — means headline comparisons (e.g., “crossings doubled” or “the border was fixed”) require careful qualification against the underlying reporting changes ^{[1] [2]}.

2. Title 42 transformed enforcement and the data

Beginning March 21, 2020, the U.S. invoked Title 42 to expel migrants in the name of public health; CBP’s encounter metrics for the southwest land border began to include both Title 8 apprehensions and Title 42 expulsions, so totals after that point are not directly comparable to earlier years unless the components are separated ^{[2] [1]}. Multiple reporting outlets and data aggregators emphasize that Title 42 produced many expulsions — BBC reports nearly three million expulsions during the policy’s March 2020–May 2023 span — and that those processed under Title 42 showed higher recidivism, inflating encounter counts ^{[3] [4]}.

3. The “gotaways” and the limits of official counts

CBP and independent trackers repeatedly note that encounters are not the same as unique individuals. The department and other sources warn that some migrants are recorded multiple times and that others evade detection entirely — the term “gotaways” captures those detected but not apprehended. One summary cites over 1.5 million gotaways up to 2020 and indicates the true number of entries is unknown because many evade detection ^[5]. Congressional and watchdog materials also highlight large increases in known gotaways since FY2021, underscoring how detection gaps and categorization affect the picture ^[6].

4. Short‑term shocks: pandemic and seasonal surges

Encounters dropped slightly between March and April 2020 as the pandemic and Title 42 expulsions took effect, then rebounded through late 2020 and surged 66% between February and March 2021 according to analysts cited by multiple outlets ^{[4] [7]}. Those sudden swings reflect short‑term shocks — public‑health restrictions, remittances, political unrest in origin countries and changes in transit conditions — rather than a steady trend that can be attributed to a single policy or administration ^{[4] [7]}.

5. Official sources and methodology matter

CBP’s public dashboards and PDFs are the baseline for these counts; the agency’s statistical pages explain that encounter data include USBP Title 8 apprehensions, OFO Title 8 inadmissibles, and Title 42 expulsions for the relevant period ^{[2] [8]}. Stat sheets such as the Border Patrol Total Apprehensions series explicitly note when methodology changes occurred ^[1]. Analysts and journalists therefore caution against using unadjusted year‑to‑year figures without referencing how the series were compiled ^{[1] [9]}.

6. Competing narratives and the risk of selective charts

Political actors frequently use selective monthly or annual numbers to argue opposite points — that enforcement succeeded or that policy failures produced unprecedented flows. FactCheck and news data projects show how cherry‑picked months can mislead: for example, December 2020 and January 2021 had high monthly apprehensions compared with some prior months, even as annual totals and counting methods differ ^{[10] [11]}. Readers should demand the underlying CBP tables and the disaggregation by Title 8 vs. Title 42 before accepting sweeping claims.

7. What the sources don’t settle

Available sources do not mention a definitive, independently validated count of unique individuals crossing between 2016–2020 that fully adjusts for repeat attempts and gotaways; DHS and CBP warn that “actual number of unique individuals” is substantially lower than total encounters but do not provide a single corrected total for that five‑year span in the cited material ^{[4] [5]}. Independent estimates vary and depend on assumptions about recidivism and detection rates.

Read the CBP statistics pages and the Border Patrol annual PDF for primary tables, and treat year‑to‑year comparisons with caution: 2016–2020 figures reflect not only shifts in flows but also a major methodological inflection in March 2020 when Title 42 expulsions were folded into encounter reporting ^{[1] [2]}.