Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) said the Trump administration has helped state forces effectively shut down illegal immigration along the Texas-Mexico border and touted a major decline in unlawful crossings in a town that was a hot spot during the Biden administration’s border crisis.
Speaking at a conservative think tank summit in Austin, Texas, Abbott revealed that illegal border crossings had plummeted in the month since President Donald Trump was sworn into office and launched a crackdown on border security.
“About two years ago in Eagle Pass, Texas, there’s a city park there that the Biden administration was processing up to 5,000 illegal immigrants a day,” Abbott said Wednesday afternoon at the Texas Public Policy Foundation’s Policy Summit.
“We shut that down by wiring it completely shut,” Abbott said, a reference to how the state locked out federal Border Patrol agents from accessing that area. “And now there are crossing, on average, less than one person a day crossing in that area.”
Statewide, crossings from Mexico have dropped to an average of 150 illegal immigrants per day, Abbott added.
The number of illegal immigrants apprehended attempting to enter the United States from Mexico in January dropped off sharply as the second Trump administration implemented a crackdown at the southern border, according to government data released Monday.
“From Jan. 21 through Jan. 31, 2025, the number of U.S. Border Patrol apprehensions along the southwest border dropped 85% from the same period in 2024,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials said in a press release Monday.
CBP attributed the decline to its “no longer catching and releasing illegal aliens into the U.S.”
The small border town of Eagle Pass faced a crisis throughout the Biden administration with the number of illegal immigrants crossing the Rio Grande and walking up into town.
In September 2023, federal law enforcement agents said the town’s 30,000 residents had seen thousands of noncitizens swimming and wading across the Rio Grande from Piedras Negras, Mexico in the last several days.
The endless flow of immigrants streaming across the border onto U.S. soil in Eagle Pass daily prompted the Border Patrol to “catch and release” people into the community, spooking residents unaccustomed to the unfamiliar faces showing up in their once-quiet neighborhoods.
The city’s Democratic mayor, Rolando Salinas, pleaded with the White House for help, to no avail.
In early 2024, amid the continued mass crossings and releases, Abbott ordered state forces to lock out Border Patrol agents from the Eagle Pass border and ordered a fence be erected around the town’s municipal park.
In doing so, Texas took on the responsibility of maintaining the national border, claiming that the federal government was not adequately enforcing border laws by simply arresting and then releasing immigrants into the country.
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Abbott said decisions made by his and Trump’s administrations to prioritize the enforcement of immigration laws now were setting the country up for success in the future.
“The border is in great hands for the next four years,” said Abbott. “In four years, he is gone. He will do a great job over the next four years to make sure we secure the border. Our goal is to ensure that over the next four years, we do a great job of preparing the border for security for the next 40 years in the great state of Texas.”