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How many illegal aliens entered the US from 2019 under the Biden Administration
Executive Summary
The available analyses show that border enforcement data under the Biden administration record roughly 10–11 million Customs and Border Protection (CBP) encounters from early FY2021 through mid–late 2024, with about 8–9 million at the Southwest land border and roughly 2 million known “gotaways,” while estimates of people actually released into the United States range near 2.5 million and “gotaways” add substantial uncertainty [1] [2] [3]. These encounter counts are not equivalent to unique individuals who “entered” and remained in the U.S., because recidivism, expulsions, removals, returns, and differing definitions (encounter vs. release vs. unlawful entry) create major measurement gaps and leave the best single-number answer indeterminate [4] [2] [5].
1. Claims on the Table — What Analysts Are Saying That Matters
Analysts and fact-checkers present several overlapping claims: that CBP recorded about 10.8–11 million nationwide encounters since the start of Fiscal Year 2021; that roughly 8–9 million of those encounters occurred at the U.S.–Mexico southwest land border; and that roughly 2–2.5 million people were released into the United States while an estimated 1.6–2 million were “gotaways” or otherwise not recorded as expulsions, returns, or removals [1] [6] [2]. These numbers are repeated in different forms across the sources, with variations driven by cutoffs (start of FY2021 versus calendar 2019–2024 windows), whether nationwide encounters are counted, and how “entering” is defined. The core factual claim therefore is about encounters, not confirmed unique migrant residents, and every source emphasizes that distinction [4] [5].
2. What the CBP Encounter Totals Actually Mean in Plain Terms
CBP’s encounter totals, as summarized in the provided analyses, count interactions between migrants and border authorities, including inadmissible encounters, expulsions, and cases where people are processed or released. Analysts report about 10–11 million such encounters under the Biden administration, with monthly and daily peaks noted in some summaries [6] [1]. Encounters can include multiple recordings of the same person—repeat crossings, repeated attempts, and multiple agency interactions—so encounter totals overstate the number of unique individuals. Sources stress that while encounters indicate enforcement workload and migration pressure, they are not a direct headcount of people who entered and stayed in the United States [4] [5].
3. The “Gotaways,” Releases, and the Invisible Flows That Skew Any Headcount
Analyses highlight two categories that complicate simple totals: “released” migrants and “gotaways.” One analytic breakdown reports about 2.5 million people released into the U.S. and around 1.6–2 million gotaways who evaded recording, together creating an estimate of roughly 4.2 million individuals who either were released or likely evaded apprehension through February–October windows cited [2]. Known gotaways are recorded by CBP as incidents where subjects elude capture or cannot be processed; they are distinct from expelled or returned individuals. This invisible component is the key uncertainty for any claim about “how many entered,” because it includes both people who remain in the country and those who later returned or were removed [2] [1].
4. Why “Entered” Is a Bad Shortcut — Releases, Expulsions, and Returns
The discrepancy between encounters and resident counts stems from policy actions and operational outcomes: during the period analyzed, authorities both expelled or returned millions and released millions more pending immigration proceedings or parole, and recorded thousands of inadmissible encounters in FY2024 alone [1]. One analysis places expulsions and removals at roughly 2.8 million in a specific timeframe while another notes nearly 3 million inadmissible encounters in FY2024, illustrating how different outcomes are tallied [2] [1]. Therefore, using encounters as a proxy for “illegal aliens who entered” misstates the record; the data support clear counts of encounters and administrative outcomes, but they do not yield a definitive total of unique unauthorized migrants who entered and remained.
5. Conflicting Numbers and the Political Uses Worth Noting
Different organizations emphasize parts of the dataset to support policy claims: congressional committees and advocacy outlets have produced fact sheets stressing the high encounter totals and gotaway figures to argue for enforcement changes, while fact-checkers focus on the distinction between encounters and unique individuals to rebut simplified claims [3] [6] [2]. These divergent emphases reveal partisan agendas: some actors highlight raw encounter totals to characterize a “crisis,” while others emphasize measurement uncertainty to push back against single-number headlines. The underlying empirical disagreement is not on CBP counts themselves but on how those counts are interpreted and presented to the public [3] [5].
6. Bottom Line — The Best Evidence-Based Answer and Its Limits
The best evidence from the provided analyses is that CBP recorded roughly 10–11 million encounters nationwide and roughly 8–9 million at the Southwest border under the Biden administration, with about 2–2.5 million releases and roughly 1.6–2 million known gotaways, producing an uncertain total of people who “entered” or remained that cannot be pinned to a single authoritative figure [1] [2] [6]. Any precise headcount of “illegal aliens who entered” from 2019 under the Biden administration is therefore not supportable from these encounter-based datasets alone, because they conflate repeat encounters, administrative outcomes, and unrecorded entries. The data are robust for describing enforcement activity and trends but insufficient for a definitive unique-individual tally [4] [5].