Residents of border towns relieved by quiet amid record-low migrant crossings

The chief of the Border Patrol says he wants “operational control” of the border, but few people are attempting to cross now amid the Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration.

As he looked out over the murky waters of the Rio Grande one day last week, Mike Banks, the head of U.S. Border Patrol, mused on the difference nine months can make.

“We’re watching cranes take off as the boats pass. We’re watching ducks fly,” Banks told NBC News aboard an airboat in Eagle Pass, Texas.

The quiet, Banks said, is a stark contrast to what he saw more than two years ago, in fall 2023, when border crossings were at a peak and the border sector where Eagle Pass is located would encounter 2,000 migrants a day.

That number is now just about 20 a day. Across the border, Customs and Border Protection apprehended the lowest number of immigrants crossing the border in the past year than at any point since 1970, DHS said in a statement on Tuesday.

Migrants attempt to cross the Rio Grande into Eagle Pass, Texas, in September 2023. NBC NewsTwo years ago, Banks was working for Texas Gov. Greg Abbott as Texas’ border czar, building one mile of buoys in the river to deter migrants from crossing. Today, he’s planning to extend the buoys 500 miles along the Rio Grande. His goal, he said, is full “operational control” of the border, with no one passing through undetected. He refers to those people as “gotaways.”