What changed at the border after January 2025?
The southwest border saw illegal crossings drop to approximately 8,300 in May 2026, a figure Customs and Border Protection released on June 5, down from more than 190,000 encounters in December 2023. The reversal happened because the executive branch stopped treating border agents as props and started letting them enforce the law. Apprehensions matter. So do deportations. And so does the message that breaking into the United States carries consequences rather than a bus ticket to a city of your choice.
Operation Lone Star in Texas did not wait for federal permission. Governor Greg Abbott expanded the state-led effort to include the installation of additional concertina wire along the Rio Grande and the deployment of Texas National Guard soldiers to deter crossing attempts. The state has spent more than $4 billion on the operation since its launch in 2021. That is not a rounding error. It is the cost of a state doing the job Washington refused to do for three years while cartels built a multi-billion-dollar smuggling industry.
The federal policy shift after January 2025 reinforced this work. Remain-in-Mexico was restored. Asylum screening was tightened. The Department of Homeland Security resumed construction of physical barriers in sectors where agents had reported repeated breaches. The result was not magic. It was deterrence. Migrants stopped paying cartels thousands of dollars per person when the odds of remaining in the United States collapsed. Smugglers who had operated openly in northern Mexico began discounting their services and looking for other routes.
The numbers deserve scrutiny rather than celebration. Border Patrol still apprehends thousands of people each month. Gotaways remain a problem in remote desert stretches. And the cartels have shifted tactics, moving more fentanyl through ports of entry and using drones to scout patrol routes. But the direction is unmistakable. A border that was overwhelmed is now manageable. A policy that invited chaos has been replaced by one that asserts sovereignty.
Why are sanctuary cities undermining the effort?
Local jurisdictions in Chicago, New York, and Denver continue to refuse cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which means federal agents must arrest criminal aliens in communities rather than in controlled jail settings. That endangers officers, endangers neighbors, and turns municipal governments into accomplices of lawbreakers who should have been removed before they could reoffend.
The numbers are not theoretical. ICE reported roughly 425,000 deportations in fiscal year 2025, the highest total in nearly a decade. But agency officials familiar with enforcement operations say sanctuary policies added weeks or months to individual cases because agents had to locate targets who had already been released from local custody. The delays cost money. They also cost lives when violent offenders reoffended before federal officers could take them into custody. A single jail release can mean a new victim.
Chicago's city council has repeatedly voted to restrict cooperation with ICE, even after high-profile cases involving suspects with prior convictions. New York City's shelter system has spent more than $2 billion housing asylum seekers since 2022, while the mayor's office complains about federal inaction even as city policies obstruct enforcement. Denver declared a state of emergency over migrant arrivals but has resisted measures that would speed removal of those without legal claims. The contradiction is brazen. These cities want federal money and federal sympathy, but they reject federal law.
Courts have repeatedly been asked to decide whether sanctuary ordinances violate federal law. The answer should be obvious. Federal immigration law applies in all fifty states. A city council cannot nullify it any more than a county sheriff can ignore the IRS. The resistance is political theater, and the audience is the Democratic base. The victims are the citizens those cities pretend to serve. Congress could solve much of this by clarifying that local authorities may not obstruct ICE detainers, but Senate Democrats have blocked such legislation.
Where does Congress need to act next?
Border security can be improved by executive action, but permanent fixes require legislation that ends catch-and-release, tightens asylum standards, and mandates employment verification through an updated E-Verify system. Without statutory changes, the next administration could reopen the border with a few strokes of a pen and erase the gains of the past eighteen months.
The Laken Riley Act, signed into law in early 2025, was a start. It required detention for illegal aliens accused of theft and burglary. But it did not solve the broader problem. The Border Patrol still needs more agents. The immigration courts still face a backlog exceeding 3 million cases. And ICE still lacks the detention bed space needed to hold everyone ordered removed. These are not small gaps. They are the reason enforcement remains uneven and the reason cartels still see opportunity.
Republicans in Congress have introduced legislation to address these gaps. Democrats have filibustered. The public should remember that when the numbers start climbing again. Enforcement works. Politics is what stops it. A nation that cannot control its border is not a nation in any meaningful sense, and no amount of rhetorical compassion changes the material consequences of mass illegal entry.
