The first Republican presidential debate is fast approaching on Aug. 23, when candidates will hope to close the gap on former President Donald Trump and separate from the rest of the pack. In this series, Up For Debate, the Washington Examiner will look at a key issue or policy every day up until debate day and where key candidates stand. Today's story will examine immigration and border security.

Homeland security and the global migration phenomenon will be leading topics during the first debate of the GOP primary season.

Between President Joe Biden's first full month in office in February 2021 and June 2023, federal law enforcement at the nation's land, air, and sea borders have encountered 6,666,409 people who attempted to enter the United States unlawfully, according to public data on Customs and Border Protection's website. Exactly 5,094,425 of the larger number were apprehended by Border Patrol agents after they crossed illegally between ports of entry on the U.S.-Mexico border.

UP FOR DEBATE: WHERE TRUMP, DESANTIS, AND REST OF REPUBLICAN 2024 FIELD STAND ON KEY ISSUES

An additional 1.5 million "gotaways," noncitizens who evaded arrest, were also counted by the Department of Homeland Security.

Both numbers blow past any other period in the Border Patrol's century existence and have drawn the attention of Republican voters.

June polling from the nonpartisan Pew Research Center revealed that illegal immigration was a top 10 concern for the public. Immigration is an even bigger issue with Republican voters. In March, immigration outranked every other issue aside from the economy.

Republican lawmakers and politicians have blamed the Biden administration for ending Trump-era initiatives at the border and inside the country that triggered the influx of people to the U.S. — one that Washington has been unable to quell for 30 months.

Biden halted hundreds of miles of border wall, lighting, technology, and road construction; barred Immigration and Customs Enforcement deportation officers from arresting illegal immigrants with less severe criminal records; stopped requiring asylum-seekers to remain in Mexico through court proceedings; and released more than 2 million illegal immigrants into the country, many without court dates or a GPS ankle monitor.

Republican candidates have jumped on the matter. Although all candidates are adamantly against illegal immigration, they vary in how to approach it.

Donald Trump

Over his four years in office, Trump took 472 executive actions on immigration — a record high, according to the Migration Policy Institute think tank. The Trump administration dragged its feet on his promise to build a border wall across the 2,000-mile international boundary, only completing 450 miles and none of it paid for by Mexico, as he had promised as a candidate.

Trump must walk a careful line between calling for more to be done while not admitting that some of his big 2016 campaign promises never came to fruition, which is where other candidates are quick to remind voters he failed.

Trump promises to "shut down" Biden's border crisis, restore the "Remain in Mexico" asylum protocols, and end "catch and release," even though his administration released more than 1.1 million illegal immigrants into the country in his four years and has claimed since then that he ended "catch and release," according to the American Immigration Council.

Where he intends to go further this time is giving state and local police, as well as the National Guard, authority only available to certain federal police to deport illegal immigrants in what promises to be the broadest operation the country has ever seen.

Trump is quick to point to lowering the number of drug-induced deaths to a 30-year low during his tenure and vowed to take the war against fentanyl to the Mexican cartels this time. He vowed to "take down the drug cartels just as he took down ISIS" by imposing a total naval embargo on cartels, ordering the Pentagon to "inflict maximum damage" to the cartels, designating them as foreign terrorist organizations, and sanctioning profits.

"President Trump will get the full cooperation of neighboring governments to dismantle the cartels, or else expose every bribe and kickback that allows these criminal networks to preserve their brutal reign," his website states. "He will ask Congress to ensure that drug smugglers and traffickers can receive the Death Penalty. When President Trump is back in the White House, the drug kingpins and vicious traffickers will never sleep soundly again."

Ron DeSantis

Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) is trying to portray himself as tougher than Trump on immigration and has used some of Trump's missed opportunities as reasons he cannot be trusted to get the job done in a second term.

DeSantis effectively led the state legislature in 2022 to pass the most comprehensive anti-illegal immigration bill in national history — the type of legislative action Biden has been unable to get lawmakers in Washington to agree on.

Since 2021, DeSantis has sent state police and military twice to the Texas border, where they help federal authorities apprehend people.

He visited the Arizona border and made a second trip through Eagle Pass this summer, where he shared his plan to lock down the border and made a positive impression on the community.

Although Democrats blasted him for flying a plane of immigrants from the Texas border to Martha's Vineyard last year, Republicans at his Texas event cheered at the mention of it.

Tim Scott

Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) made his inaugural border visit in late July and dropped by Yuma, Arizona, to hear from local officials about the impact that the mass crossings have had on the border city for the past several years.

"On my first day as Commander-in-Chief, the strongest nation on Earth will stop retreating from our own southern border," Scott's website states. "If you don't control your back door, it's not your house. And if our southern border is unsafe and insecure, it's not our country."

Scott's campaign website placed border security at the top of its policy page and has made it a top talking point on the campaign trail. He has since released a lengthy plan that deters and responds to illegal immigration.

A Scott administration would return to the public health pandemic policy known as Title 42, which barred immigrants from seeking asylum at the ports of entry and allowed federal agents who apprehended illegal crossers between the ports to send people back to Mexico immediately. Title 42 prevents immigrants from being taken into custody; therefore, immigrants cannot be prosecuted for illegal entry, which resulted in high recidivism under Trump and Biden.

Scott touted his success in passing the FEND Off Fentanyl Act, which directs the Treasury Department to use its economic sanctions to "choke off" the profits of the Chinese entities that make the precursor ingredients and the Mexican cartels that compile the ingredients into the finished product and then push it into the U.S. across.

He would also designate Mexican drug cartels as terrorists, deploy more military to the border, and force cities and states to work with federal officers making arrests of criminal illegal immigrants in communities.

Nikki Haley

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley spent a day exploring the border in Texas in early April and pitched a long-term plan to fix outdated immigration protocols.

The former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations proposed a business-first approach as the cornerstone of her proposed solution.

"When it comes to actual immigration laws itself, instead of doing quotas every year on how many we're going to let in, you partner with your businesses and see what they need. And when you do that, all of a sudden, you're looking for merit, and you're working for the economy in South Carolina," Haley said during the tour. "We've got farmers, or we've got a tourist industry that's always looking for workers. When you start to listen to your businesses and do what they [want], all of a sudden, the economy goes up, people are put to work, and everything gets better."

Haley called for 25,000 more Border Patrol and ICE personnel, in addition to the 19,000 Border Patrol and fewer than 25,000 ICE employees, but acknowledged the numbers may be in flux if immediate changes, such as stopping "catch and release" and restoring the Trump-era "Remain in Mexico" plan, bore results and can be sustained.

Haley wants more people deported and would also reinstate the pandemic-era Title 42 policy, as well as cut federal funding for sanctuary cities. But she said she also wants to expand pathways for legal immigration by remaking the visa process to meet the needs of businesses while mandating businesses nationwide vet new hires to ensure they have a legal right to work.

Vivek Ramaswamy

Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy views the military as the primary solution to the fentanyl epidemic.

Ramaswamy has presented 25 policies that he would push forward if elected, including three that focus on border security and immigration. Similar to DeSantis, he vowed to go beyond what Trump accomplished.

Ramaswamy would withhold federal grants to cities that have walked back violent crime prosecutions and bail laws.

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Outside the U.S., he would "use our military to annihilate Mexican drug cartels" and said the U.S. needs to view fentanyl as a China problem, dubbing it the Chinese Communist Party's opium war. Chinese labs produce the ingredients that Mexican cartels use to make the final product that is then moved across the border and dispersed across the country.

Ramaswamy was the only candidate to call for the use of drones to secure the border, something that is already being used by federal agents and officers but far less than Mexican cartels. Drones allow operators to see what is happening miles away from a bird's eye view.