Statement from U.S. Customs and Border Protection:
When our ports of entry reach capacity, when their ability to manage all of their missions —
counter-narcotics, national security, facilitation of lawful trade — is challenged by the time and
the space to process people that are arriving without documents, from time to time we have to
manage the queues and address that processing based on that capacity.
By putting officers on the bridge, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is taking a
proactive approach to ensure that arriving travelers have valid entry documents in order to
expedite the processing of lawful travel. That being said, CBP processes undocumented persons
as expeditiously as possible without negating the agency's overall mission, or compromising the
safety of individuals within our custody.
The number of inadmissible individuals CBP is able to process varies based upon case
complexity; available resources; medical needs; translation requirements; holding/detention
space; overall port volume; and ongoing enforcement actions. No one is being denied the
opportunity to make a claim of credible fear or seek asylum. CBP officers allow more people
into our facilities for processing once space becomes available or other factors allow for
additional parties to arrive.
Port of Entry facilities were not designed to hold hundreds of people at a time who may be
seeking asylum. And we are also charged with keeping the flow of legitimate trade and travel.
Balancing these demands, keeping illicit goods and people out of the country, and managing the
influx of Central Americans seeking asylum (along with everything else we do) requires a
careful balance of our resources and space.
Depending upon port circumstances at the time of arrival, individuals presenting without
documents may need to wait in Mexico as CBP officers work to process those already within our
facilities. The number of inadmissible individuals we are able to process in a day varies based
on the complexity of the cases, resources available, medical needs, translation requirements,
holding/detention space, overall port volume and enforcement actions. As in the past when
we’ve had to limit the number of people we can bring in for processing at a given time, we
expect that this will be a temporary situation.