Although there are fewer immigrants at the border waiting to get into the U.S. looking for asylum it was a different story in December.

When Title 42 was extended in December, El Paso made national news as the border saw an increase of immigrants. President Joe Biden and New York Mayor Eric Addams even came to witness. And there were from 400 to 500 immigrant deaths on the Border Highway by the end of 2022 as reported in Elpasotexas.gov. 

Title 42 is a protocol that was initiated to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and administered by the Trump administration in 2020.

The termination date of Title 42 was set by the Biden administration, but the Supreme Court temporarily stopped the termination of Title 42 in February. 

Last August immigrants slowly tried to enter the U.S. seeking asylum from Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Venezuela; getting attention from the White House.

Humanitarian agencies from El Paso released a number of immigrants, growing from 250 a day in early August, to 1000 per day in September, reported by Elpasotexas.gov.

With immigrants staying in Mexico, the U.S. and Mexican governments announced that Mexico would accept land-border expulsions of citizens of Venezuela under Title 42.

On Dec. 17, El Paso’s mayor Oscar Leeser issued a disaster declaration due to Title 42 expiration.

“Talking to some of our federal partners they believe that on Wednesday our numbers will go to 4, 5 or 6,000, and when I asked them, I said do you believe that you guys can handle it today, the answer was no. And when I heard the answer was no, I knew we had to do something right away,” Leeser said, to ktsm.com.