The Sconi

Department of Homeland Security Sec. Alejandro Mayorkas said in a recent interview that the southern border is "secure" despite U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) statistics indicating arrests at the southern border during Fiscal Year 2022 is nearing two million, a record high. 

Border arrests through July number 1,822,160, the CPB reports, which is higher than FY2021's total of 1.66 million. With roughly two months left in FY2022, which runs from Oct. 1, 2021 through Sept. 30, analysts predict arrests at the southern border will break the two-million mark for the first time, according to the Wall Street Journal. 

Although fiscal year-over-year numbers suggest a record number of arrests, month-to-month comparisons are showing a decline, according to the CPB report. The July statistics record 199,976 encounters along the southern border in July, down four percent from June, the CPB reports. 

“This marks the second month in a row of decreased encounters along the Southwest border," CPB Commissioner Chris Magnus said in the report. "While the encounter numbers remain high, this is a positive trend and the first two-month drop since October 2021.” 

DHS Sec. Mayorkas, speaking at the Aspen Security Forum in July, told an interviewer that "the southern border is secure," according to a video of the interview posted to YouTube by the GOP War Room. The secretary's comments drew criticism from Republicans.

"How insulting is it that DHS Secretary Mayorkas says the border is "secure" when: Border patrol agents need help," the Republican State Leadership Committee wrote in a July 25 Twitter post. "Our fentanyl crisis is worsening. CBP numbers keep rising. Families' lives are in danger & this admin keeps turning a blind eye."

The CPB reports in its July statistics that drug seizures are down one percent nationwide in July compared to June. However, only seizures of cocaine showed a marked decrease, down 56%, according to the CDC. Seizures of methamphetamine increased 15%, heroin was up 8%, and fentanyl seizures were up a staggering 203%, according to the CPB.

Families Against Fentanyl reports its analysis shows that fentanyl is the leading cause of death for Americans ages 18 to 45, Narcanon reported in April.

In Wisconsin, the number of fentanyl-related overdose deaths increased nearly 100% in the past two years, according to the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (WDHS), which identified synthetic opioids, mostly fentanyl, in 91% of opioid overdose deaths and 73% of all overdose deaths in the past year. The number of fentanyl overdose deaths in the state increased 97% from 651 in 2019 to 1,280 in 2021, according to the WDHS.

"The sharp increase in overdose deaths is not only impacting those who use opioids," the agency wrote in its report. "Cocaine deaths involving synthetic opioids increased by 134 percent from 2019 (182) to 2021 (426), and it is estimated that as many as 40 percent of counterfeit pills contain enough fentanyl to be lethal."