Tale of two cities: Biden’s and Trump’s border visits tell very different stories

President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are both visiting the southern border on Thursday, but the two places the men are visiting have differing accounts of the immigration crisis.

The border towns where Biden and Trump are visiting, Brownsville, Texas, and Eagle Pass, Texas, respectively, have seen significant changes in their dynamics with illegal immigration in recent years, which both men appear eager to capitalize on.

Brownsville, in the Rio Grande Valley, has seen crossings drop in recent years, and under Biden’s presidency, the area has dropped from the top corridor for border crossings in 2022. The Rio Grande Valley led in the total number of U.S. Customs and Border Protection encounters, according to the agency’s data, from fiscal 2014 until fiscal 2021, when it was passed by the Del Rio sector.

The Del Rio sector, where Eagle Pass is located, saw a steady increase in encounters from fiscal 2014 until fiscal 2019, remaining in the tens of thousands, but exploded in fiscal 2021 with more than 200,000 crossings. It then passed the Rio Grande Valley as the busiest sector and still remained ahead of the Rio Grande Valley in fiscal 2023 despite falling to second place behind the El Paso sector.

Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) has focused much of his push on border security, known as Operation Lone Star, with efforts in Eagle Pass. Under the direction of Abbott, the state has refused to allow Border Patrol agents into a state park near Eagle Pass as he seeks to keep border protections in the Rio Grande intact. The town of roughly 30,000 people has become the center of the border crisis.