Customs and Border Protection agents have already caught 31 illegals who are on the terror watchlist, according to CBP data, a number that is on pace to make fiscal year 2024 the highest ever.
Fiscal Year 2023 set a record of 172 illegals caught who were on the terror watchlist. The new fiscal year began Oct. 1. CBP collared 98 on the terror list in FY 2022. The current pace of FY24 is at 186.
The numbers also coincide with a rise in names that have been added to the Terrorist Screening Dataset, also known as the watchlist, which sits at roughly 2 million people, according to CBS News. By comparison, there were 1.16 million people on the watchlist in 2017.
CBP was warned Oct. 20 to be especially vigilant for members of terrorist groups Hamas, Hezbollah, and Palestine Islamic Jihad trying to pass through the southern border in the wake of the Israel-Hamas war that began on Oct. 7.
"Encounters of watchlisted individuals at our borders are very uncommon, underscoring the critical work CBP Agents and Officers carry out every day on the frontlines. DHS works tirelessly to secure our borders through a combination of highly trained personnel, ground and aerial monitoring systems, and robust intelligence and information sharing networks," CBP said in its data reporting updated Friday.
The numbers also coincide with the droves of illegals pouring through the border at record pace. CBP has encountered 617,865 illegals through the first two months of FY24, outpacing FY23 by nearly 55,000 over the same time frame. And FY23 set a record with 3.2 million encounters.
House Committee on Homeland Security Chair Mark Green, R-Tenn., slammed Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas earlier this week for "national security malpractice."
"The number of individuals apprehended illegally crossing the Southwest border and found to be on the terrorist watchlist has increased 2,500 percent from Fiscal Years 2017-2020 to Fiscal Year 2023. And those are only who we've caught," Green said Wednesday. "Border security is national security; and right now, the border is not secure. ... Secretary Mayorkas must be held accountable for this national security malpractice."
Mayorkas, along with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Homeland Security Adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall, have been dispatched by President Joe Biden to Mexico for a meeting with Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to talk border security. The move was seen as Biden's reply to House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., who earlier Thursday urged Biden to use executive action on the border crisis.
Further, Johnson called for Biden to open talks with Lopez Obrador about reinstituting the Trump-era program Remain in Mexico, though it's unclear if that will be a talking point in the meetings between Biden's envoys and the Mexican president.
The visit is expected to take place next week.
Mark Swanson ✉
Mark Swanson, a Newsmax writer and editor, has nearly three decades of experience covering news, culture and politics.
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