Number of illegal aliens that entered the country during Biden administration
Executive summary
The question “How many illegal aliens entered the country during the Biden administration?” does not have a single authoritative tally because officials and analysts use different measures — “encounters” at the border, people released into the U.S., those removed or expelled, and estimates of the unauthorized population who remain; raw encounter counts between February 2021 and later reporting range in the mid‑millions, while estimates of how many actually stayed are substantially lower than political claims of 20–30 million [1] [2] [3].
1. What the government counts: encounters, releases and removals
Department of Homeland Security and related reporting show millions of “encounters” — the initial contacts between migrants and U.S. border authorities — during the Biden years, with one aggregation showing about 6.5 million encounters from February 2021 through October of a given reporting window and another fact‑check noting that in initial processing roughly 2.5 million people were released into the U.S. while 2.8 million were removed or expelled [1]; separately, some advocacy and partisan tallies count encounters differently and extend timeframes, producing higher encounter totals [4] [5].
2. Encounters are not the same as people who permanently entered and stayed
Multiple fact‑checking organizations and migration scholars caution that encounters double‑count repeat crossers and include people who were later removed or expelled, so treating encounter totals as permanent additions materially overstates how many “entered and stayed” [1] [2]. For example, FactCheck.org emphasized the split between releases and removals in DHS processing and warned that raw encounter numbers can be misleading when converted into claims about the size of the undocumented population [1].
3. Official and academic estimates of the unauthorized population show growth, but not a 20–30 million surge
Nonpartisan demographers at the Pew Research Center estimated the U.S. unauthorized immigrant population reached about 14 million in 2023 — a record high — reflecting growth since 2020 but not implying that 20 million people entered and remained during Biden’s presidency [6] [2]. Independent fact checks and reporting concluded that the headline claims that 20–30 million people “entered and stayed” during the Biden administration are unsupported by the underlying data [2] [3].
4. Alternate tallies and political claims: big numbers, different agendas
Republican congressional and advocacy materials have circulated much larger figures by combining encounters, “gotaways,” parole admissions (including CHNV parole programs), and extending time windows — for instance, some Republican sources claim encounter totals well into the millions beyond those under the prior administration and cite figures like 8+ million or 6.7 million “new inadmissible aliens” in varying contexts [4] [5]. These sources frequently use encounter‑style metrics to make partisan policy arguments about enforcement and border policy; reporters and researchers note that those choices reflect an advocacy framing rather than a demographic headcount [4] [5].
5. Enforcement and removals also rose — complicating any “net additions” calculation
Migration Policy Institute and other analysts point out that the Biden years saw large numbers of repatriations and removals as well — one compilation counted nearly 4.4 million repatriations and related actions over the administration’s period, and the administration reported spikes in removals after policy shifts such as the end of Title 42 [7]. That means many encounters did not result in long‑term settlement, further undercutting simplistic conversions of encounters into permanent population increases [7] [1].
6. Bottom line: a defensible short answer and the limits of the data
A defensible short answer is: government encounter counts during Biden’s term number in the mid‑millions (commonly cited aggregates around 6–8 million encounters, depending on timeframe and definitions), about 2.5 million were initially released in one DHS‑based analysis, and removals/expulsions number in the millions too — but the number of people who entered and remained is substantially lower than repeated political claims of 20–30 million; nonpartisan population estimates put the unauthorized population at roughly 14 million in 2023 [1] [7] [6] [2]. There is no single official figure that equates “encounters” with “new residents,” and partisan tallies that do so should be treated with caution [1] [2].