Illegal border crossings have dropped 96% from their Biden-era peak and hit the lowest level since Nixon was in the White House. Nine straight months of zero releases. No new legislation. And every Democrat who swore this was impossible is now watching their worst nightmare unfold in the polling data.
You know what’s even better than being right? Being right with receipts.
Remember the pitch? “Comprehensive immigration reform” was the only answer. We needed a 2,000-page bill, bipartisan working groups, study committees, and about twelve more years of open borders while Congress “worked on it.” Every Democrat in Washington delivered this line with the same earnest expression they use when pretending to care about the national debt.
Turns out all President Trump had to do was enforce the laws that were already on the books. Revolutionary concept. But its something Biden and Harris couldn’t accomplish.
The numbers are savage. CBP recorded just 237,538 encounters at the southwestern border in fiscal year 2025 — the lowest since 1970. Under Biden, they were hitting nearly a million in a single quarter. Q1 of fiscal 2024? A staggering 988,512 encounters. That’s not a decline, that’s a demolition.
Border Patrol has gone nine consecutive months without releasing a single illegal alien into the country. Nine months of zero. The catch-and-release assembly line that Biden operated like an Amazon fulfillment center? Boarded up.
And the sanctuary cities that volunteered to be Biden’s dumping grounds? They’re tallying up the bill. New York City has torched $6.9 billion on asylum seekers since 2022 — $3.75 billion in fiscal year 2024 alone. The good news? That number is projected to drop to $1.22 billion in FY2026 and $341 million by 2029. Turns out when you stop the flow at the border, the downstream costs dry up too.
The media is doing backflips trying to spin a 96% drop as anything other than a vindication. The same outlets that called the border crisis “manufactured” are now running “fact checks” on whether Trump really deserves credit. Spoiler: he does.
Where This Is Going
Here’s what nobody in the Democratic Party wants to talk about heading into the midterms: immigration is now their single most toxic issue, and it’s not even close.
A recent poll in battleground districts has Democrats at -58 on immigration — 19% approve, 77% disapprove. Republicans lead by 4 to 11 points on immigration in every single recent poll. And Democrats’ congressional job approval just hit a record low of 18%.
Now do the math. Democrats currently lead the generic congressional ballot by 6 to 8 points — mostly on economic issues like prices and health care. That’s their whole midterm strategy: ignore immigration, talk about inflation.
Here’s the trap Republicans are setting — and it’s a beauty. Every time a Democrat candidate in a swing district gets asked about the border, they have two options: admit Trump fixed it (which infuriates their base) or claim it’s still broken (which makes them look delusional to everyone who can read a chart). There is no good answer. The 96% number is a kill shot that doesn’t miss.
The last time Democrats were this underwater on a single issue heading into a midterm was crime in 1994. That year, Republicans picked up 54 House seats and took the majority for the first time in 40 years. Democrats aren’t staring down a wave that big yet — their leads on health care and “democracy” are keeping them afloat — but immigration is the anchor tied to their ankle. Every debate, every town hall, every attack ad — the 96% number is going to be on a billboard behind every Republican candidate in America.
Mark my words: by September, Democrats will be running ads claiming they supported border security all along. The same people who called the wall “racist” and ICE agents “Gestapo” will be standing in front of border fencing for campaign photos. And every Republican opponent will have the receipts.
The border is secure. The catch-and-release scam is over. And the political fallout is just getting started.
