More than 525,000 illegal border crossers were reported in California in fiscal 2024, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data.
This excludes those who illegally entered and evaded capture, known as gotaways. CBP doesn’t publicly report gotaway data. The Center Square first reported gotaway data in 2021 after obtaining it from a Border Patrol agent. In fiscal 2023, there were over 101,000 gotaways reported in California’s two sectors and nearly 413,000 apprehensions, The Center Square exclusively reported.
Fiscal 2024 gotaway data is forthcoming, but if trends continue as they have in the past, California’s total reported illegal border crossers, including apprehensions and gotaways, are expected to surpass 625,000 in fiscal 2024. That’s up from nearly 514,000 combined in fiscal 2023.
The data also excludes inadmissables released into California through roughly a dozen parole programs created under the Biden-Harris administration that federal judges, roughly half of state attorneys general, and Congressional Republicans argue are illegal.
California shares the smallest international border with Mexico of the four southwest border states – 137 miles. It’s nearly evenly split in linear land mileage between the CBP sectors of El Centro and San Diego.
The San Diego Sector is the largest of the two sectors, covering nearly 57,000 square miles, including 931 miles of coastal border stretching to Oregon. It shares 60 linear miles with Mexico by land and 114 coastal miles along the Pacific Ocean.
The area with the greatest foot traffic includes roughly 7,000 square miles that encompasses beaches, mesas, an inland mountain range, canyons and high desert.
The greatest number of apprehensions have historically been reported in the San Diego Sector. In fiscal 2024, San Diego Sector Border Patrol agents apprehended at least 324,260 illegal border crossers, representing a 40% increase from their fiscal year 2023 apprehensions of 230,941.
San Diego Office of Field Operations reported 183,890 encounters with illegal foreign nationals in fiscal 2024, according to the data.
Now retired San Diego Sector Chief Border Patrol Agent Aaron Heitke has testified before Congress about the hardships San Diego Sector agents faced resulting from what he described as Biden-Harris administration “open border policies.” He’s described the impact of having to close Border Patrol checkpoints when illegal entries peaked in July 2022 to roughly 16,000 knowing that miles of the border were left wide open and unpatrolled.
He’s also testified how agents were ordered not to report an alarming increase in “special interest aliens” and continue to grapple with unaccompanied minors believed to be drugged, smuggled and trafficked. California agents have also expressed alarm about the volume of fentanyl pouring through the sector as federal, state and local law enforcement officers have seized enough fentanyl in one year to kill billions of people.
In the El Centro Sector, Border Patrol agents apprehended 17,484 illegal border crossers in fiscal 2024. The sector lies in the Imperial Valley of Southern California and spans 71 linear miles along the U.S.-Mexico border. Much of it is remote and dangerous, including desert and mountainous terrain where summer heat regularly exceeds 120 degrees.
El Centro Sector Chief Patrol Agent Gregory Bovino has expressed alarm about unaccompanied children who agents rescue “from being exploited by smugglers. These criminals are not related to the children they smuggle. These traffickers go to extreme lengths to smuggle these children – giving them sleep aids to keep them quiet.”
El Centro Chief Border Patrol Agent Gregory Bovino also told members of Congress that a surge of more than 50,000 illegal border crossers in fiscal 2023 took agents away from their primary purpose to protect the homeland. “Any time there is a surge of individuals processing care, feeding and care of those individuals takes Border Patrol agents away from their primary job of preventing bad people and bad things from coming across the border,” Bovino said.
As Texas’ border security mission, Operation Lone Star, put pressure on cartel traffickers, illegal border crossers were moved west, with the San Diego Sector becoming the epicenter of the border crisis, The Center Square first reported in February and again in April as the crisis worsened.
California has also reported an increase in Chinese illegal border crossers as federal agents continue to target California-based Chinese-linked money laundering operations linked to the Sinaloa Cartel, The Center Square reported.
California sheriffs have expressed their opposition to Vice President Kamala Harris’ border policies, saying, “we do not support her,” The Center Square reported. One sheriff told members of Congress that the policies of the Biden-Harris administration and Gov. Gavin Newsom turned California into “an open territory for the cartel to do whatever it wants.”
Combined, apprehensions in California’s two sectors totaled at least 525,634, excluding gotaways. Data for both sectors is consistent with nationwide data: the overwhelming majority of illegal border crossers are single adults coming from all over the world.
