Visualization by Felippe Rodrigues
The brunt of President Donald Trump’s immigration policy has been directed toward the southern border, highlighted by plans to build a border wall and the administration’s family separation policy.
But while attention has focused on the southwestern border region, apprehensions of families crossing the U.S.-Canadian border illegally in the Swanton sector are at a five year high, according to data recently released by Customs and Border Patrol.
During the most recent federal fiscal year, starting in October 2017 ending September 30, 2018, border agents arrested 142 families attempting to cross into the U.S. from Canada in the Swanton sector of the northern border—an area encompassing all of Vermont, stretching from New Hampshire’s border with Maine to eastern New York. The sector is headquartered in Swanton.
During the same period in 2017, border agents detained only 37 families. The highest number of families detained in Swanton sector in recent years was 63 during 2013.
In September 2018 alone, 69 families crossing into the U.S. were apprehended by border agents in the Swanton sector. That monthly total was higher than the annual total of family apprehensions in any other sector along the northern border last year. The Border Patrol defines a “family unit” as two adults and at least one child.
The total number of people caught illegally crossing into the U.S. in the Swanton sector reached its highest level since 2011. Border Patrol apprehended 736 people in the sector in federal fiscal year 2018, up from 449 in fiscal 2017. This is the highest number of total arrests since 2011, when the number was 815.
There is no public information on what happened to the 142 families after they were detained by border agents. They could have been detained and then released, referred to a U.S. attorney’s office for prosecution, or Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) could have taken them into custody.
If a U.S. attorney’s office takes over, the individuals would be held until their immigration case was brought in criminal court, but if ICE took custody of the individuals they could be sent to family detention centers as far away as Arizona.
ICE did not respond to multiple requests for comment on how many, if any, of the 142 families arrested in the Swanton sector have been detained by the federal agency.
U.S. Attorney for the District of Vermont Christina Nolan said there were a total of 357 arrests of people who were specifically trying to cross the border into Vermont last year — almost triple the total of 132 in 2017.
Nolan said her office prosecuted 70 people related to border crossings last year, but that families were not among those her office dealt with.
“We have not had a prosecution that has resulted in the separation of a child from their mother,” Nolan said.
Visualization by Felippe Rodrigues
James Duff Lyall, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union Vermont, said it is difficult to comment on nothing more than a number but that he would expect the families being arrested to be either detained and then released—in a catch and release strategy—or are detained in local facilities until they have a date in U.S. immigration court.
Lyall said the third option for the families would be to be sent to ICE family detention centers.
“My guess would be that that is what’s happening to those folks,” Lyall said. “But what’s happening to the people behind those numbers is the real story.”
The Trump administration has repeatedly tried to make changes to current immigration laws to curb the number of migrants entering the country, including by imposing severe restrictions on asylum, and expanding the criminal prosecution of adults that cross the southern border illegally — a policy that resulted in the separation of thousands of children from their parents.
A federal judge in San Diego recently ordered the administration to reunite more than 2,500 separated children, in a process that is ongoing.
Border Patrol has said that smuggling operations have begun to use the tactic of sending families across the southern border because adults who arrive with children are typically detained for shorter periods than adults traveling solo.
There is not a clear reason for the 2018 uptick in the number of families arrested or for the increase in the total individuals being arrested in the Swanton sector, though officials say changes in Canadian visa policies may be a factor. It is not a result of additional agents patrolling the border, with staffing in the area staying relatively constant over the past five years, hovering around 300 agents to patrol the roughly 24,000 square miles in the area.
Mike McCarthy, a spokesperson Customs and Border Protection, said the department does not speculate on the reason for the increase in detentions, but pointed to a perception that it is easier to cross into the U.S. along the northern border than in the southwest.
McCarthy said Canada’s decision to change its visa policy and lift restrictions for people from countries, including Mexico and Romania, makes it easier for people to travel to Canada and then attempt to cross into the U.S. This could be a possible reason for the arrests made during 2018, according to McCarthy.
McCarthy said the two interstates that cut through Vermont to Canada make the state attractive for human smuggling operations and that agents in the Swanton sector have increased their efforts to crack down on these operations.
“The proximity of major thoroughfares—such as I-91 and I-89—leading from the border to the interior of the United States, has long made Swanton sector an attractive crossing point to human smugglers,” McCarthy said. “To disrupt these smuggling activities, U.S. Border Patrol deploys a robust complement of manpower, intelligence, technology, community engagement, and defense-in-depth strategies, such as immigration checkpoints.”
“This approach has proven successful in thwarting illegal border crossing activity throughout Swanton sector,” he added.
Nolan has also said she also believes the increase in southbound illegal crossings into the U.S. stems from changes in Canadian visa policy.
Former Republican Newport state representative Gary Viens, who was a border agent for 20 years before he retired in 2010, believes Canada’s new visa policy, that has allowed more people from Mexico to come to Canada and then travel south, is the main reason for the surge in the number of families and individuals being arrested in the Swanton sector.
“There has been a big uptick of people from Mexico flying to Montreal so they can travel into Vermont,” Viens said. “Because if they are claiming asylum at the southwest border they are told to stay in Mexico as they wait.”
Visualization by Felippe Rodrigues
In 2018, 173 people from Mexico were apprehended in the Swanton sector. This is the highest number of Mexican nationals to be detained in the Swanton sector of the northern border since 2008 when 271 Mexicans were arrested.
Customs and Border Protection does not break down where the families came from in its data.
The current snapshot of arrests in the Swanton sector is markedly different than in the early 2000s when 2,700 people were arrested throughout the Swanton sector in 2004, and an even farther cry from the current arrests and detentions taking place along the southern border.
In the Tucson sector of the southern border alone there were 53,000 individuals and almost 5,000 families arrested.
It was reported earlier this month that the Trump administration is projecting that as many as 180,000 migrants could arrive at the southern border by May.
But despite the recent national increases, the number of arrests along the southern U.S. border have been hovering at near record lows, primarily because of a long-term decline in individual adults being arrested at the border because of deterrence strategies that date back to former President Bill Clinton’s time in office.
Under federal law, Border Patrol has broad authority to conduct searches of vehicles within 100 miles of the border, including international waters. Roughly two-thirds of the U.S. population lives in that zone.
Vermont’s congressional delegation has come out strongly against the scope of Border Patrol authority long distances from the international boundary. After learning that border officials planned to set up highway checkpoints in Vermont last year — similar to the checkpoint near White River Junction on interstate I-91 during the early 2000s — Sens. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Peter Welch issued a statement against the enforcement action.
In a recent interview, Leahy said he has not heard anything further about Border Patrol plans to set up interior checkpoints.
Leahy and Welch have said they plan to reintroduce legislation to curb the powers of Border Patrol. A bill to be introduced in the Senate and the House would restrict the distance from an international border or ocean that border agents could conduct roadblocks and checkpoints to 25 miles. Sanders has co-sponsored similar legislation in the past.
Read the story on VTDigger here: Family border apprehensions reach five-year high in Swanton sector.