[Y]ou claim that we have failed to enforce our immigration laws. That is false. We have provided Congress and your Committee hours of testimony, thousands of documents, hundreds of briefings, and much more information that demonstrates quite clearly how we are enforcing the law. The extensive material we have provided informed you that, for example:
*This Administration has removed, retuned, or expelled more migrants in three years than the prior Administration did in four years. Since May 12,2023, DHS has removed or returned more than 500,000 individuals, the vast majority of whom crossed the Southwest Border.
*Total removals and returns since mid-May 2023 exceed removals and returns in every full fiscal year since 2015.
*Daily removals and returns are nearly double what they were compared to the pre- pandemic average from 2014 to 2019. The majority of individuals encountered at the Southwest Border throughout this Administration have been removed, returned, or expelled.
*We have significantly increased the number of removal flights within the Wester Hemisphere since the end of Title 42, sending over 20 flights per week of individuals who have been rapidly processed and determined to be removable. We continue to repatriate individuals to more than 150 countries.
Before 2013, the majority of individuals attempting to cross the border entered without being caught. Under this Administration, the estimated annual apprehension rate has averaged 78%, the same average rate of apprehension as in the prior Administration.
