CBP announces Fiscal Year 2019 statistics for Southern California ports of entry

U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers conducting security operations at California’s ports of entry with Mexico performed more than 78 million inspections of travelers, seized more than 104 tons of illegal narcotics and apprehended almost 35,000 immigration violators during federal fiscal year 2019.

CBP’s field office in San Diego includes the San Ysidro, Otay Mesa, Tecate, Calexico, Andrade and the San Diego air and sea ports of entry.

During the fiscal year, which ended September 30, CBP officers at ports in San Diego and Imperial counties inspected more than 31 million passenger vehicles, more than 1.4 million trucks, almost 55,000 buses, and almost 22 million pedestrians entering the U.S.

The total amount of narcotics seized during the year at California’s six ports of entry with Mexico increased 24 percent compared to the previous period. Marijuana seizures increased 6 percent to 112,419 pounds; cocaine seizures increased 16 percent to 12,034 pounds; heroin seizures decreased 10 percent to 2,560 pounds; and methamphetamine seizures increased 66 percent to 80,548 pounds.

The focused enforcement efforts by California’s border ports accounted for 39 percent of the marijuana, 13 percent of the cocaine, 47 percent of the heroin and 63 percent of the methamphetamine seized at ports of entry nationwide.

The apprehension of individuals with outstanding felony warrants for such crimes as homicide, robbery and assault by local, state or federal police agencies decreased 25 percent compared to last year’s numbers:  1,431 this fiscal year compared to 1,911 arrests during the same period last year.

CBP officers with emergency response or medical first responder training at the ports of entry provided medical assistance 1,222 times during the fiscal year.

CBP agriculture specialists performed almost 5.4 million agricultural inspections in the passenger environment and more than 76,000 inspections in the cargo environment.  These inspections resulted in about 63,700 seizures of prohibited plant materials, meat, or animal products and finding about 650 cargo shipments that did not meet the U.S. entry requirements, causing the shipments to either be sent back, treated, or destroyed.

“These impressive results should be credited to the men and women serving on the front lines at our ports of entry,” said Pete Flores, director of Field Operations for CBP in San Diego.  “Their daily efforts secure our nation’s borders while facilitating the flow of legitimate travel and trade.”

“Some of the numbers are staggering,” said Pete Flores, director of Field Operations for CBP in San Diego.  “Ten years ago, we seized less than 4,000 pounds of methamphetamine, which was still a significantly higher number than the year before.  And now we are seizing more than 80,000 pounds in a year.  Fentanyl, as a category of narcotics, didn’t even exist a decade ago.  When it comes to narcotics smuggling, we see the same trends continuing of more hard narcotics smuggling attempts, and deeper, more involved concealment methods.”

Additional inadmissible alien statistics are available here.