U.S. border migration drop follows coordinated enforcement by Mexico, Panama, Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador
The transformation of Central American countries like Panama, Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala into migration barriers, along with the Mexican government’s efforts to control irregular migration flows, has led to an unprecedented contraction in migration to the United States.
This situation arose after these five countries collectively reduced the flow of irregular migrants by approximately 1.7 million people in the last year, a regional decline that explains the historic drop in apprehensions at the U.S. border and its lowest levels since the pandemic.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reported that in fiscal year 2025, 443,671 migrants were apprehended while attempting to cross the border with Mexico, compared to 2,135,000 a year earlier. This represents an annual reduction of nearly 80 percent and a real decrease of almost 1.7 million migrants.
According to Milton Muñoz, a migration specialist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), this reduction is largely due to several Central American countries closing their borders to irregular migrants under direct pressure from Washington.
“Donald Trump managed the ‘big stick’ tactics with other Latin American countries, where there is or was a significant flow of migrants, to turn them into real walls, an externalization of the United States’ borders. And to that we also have to add some leaders who have been quite harsh on undocumented immigration,” he explained.
