Although illegal border crossings have plummeted in the last year, illegal migrants and cartel networks have gotten savvier in their attempts to land on American soil.
The number of “inadmissible migrants” trying to enter via airports and seaports has more than doubled in recent months, indicating that now is not the time for lax security measures at U.S. points of entry.
The number of “inadmissibles” — people without valid documentation arriving at ports of entry — is up by about 72% over the last 12 months, according to a new report from Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.
TRAC wrote in an analysis the number of inadmissibles arriving at ports has jumped to more than 20,000 in January. The number of non-citizens admitted temporarily and paroled rose from just over 3,000 in February 2025 to nearly 13,000 in January of this year.
The ongoing partial government shutdown is likely letting more terrorists and unauthorized migrants slip through the cracks with long airport security lines and frustrated Transportation Security Administration agents.
TSA employees are calling in sick or quitting in record numbers, while 44,000 active-duty U.S. Coast Guard members continue to work without pay during the federal funding lapse.
Republicans have warned that Democrats are jeopardizing people’s lives and putting the nation’s national security at risk. They are also deliberately thwarting the efforts of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, specifically accused Democrats of having “blood on their hands” if they continue blocking funding.
The current shutdown is the third time since October 2025 that some DHS employees have had to work without pay. Affected workers who are missing paychecks include TSA, FEMA, Coast Guard, Secret Service and Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.
“We are asking our Coast Guard members to protect our waters without paying them,” Craig Carter, national president of the Federal Managers Association, said Monday in a report from Federal News Network. “At a time when our nation faces extreme security risks it is critical to fund the agency and the dedicated federal employees there that keep us safe.”
One particular concerning category of illegal migrants, referred to as “inadmissibles,” show up at airports and seaports without fully valid paperwork. This means they do not have a visa or other proper documents allowing them to legally enter the U.S.
Port authorities have three options with inadmissibles: expedited deportation, a longer deportation court battle, or release them on parole.
Analysts at the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse noted that the surge in inadmissibles coincides once again with a major jump in parole, The Washington Times reported. Some 61.5% of inadmissibles now secure parole.
“Port authorities allowed an increasing number of noncitizens to enter the country through parole,” TRAC wrote in an analysis. “Immigration parole allows noncitizens to temporarily enter and reside in the U.S. without formal admission, usually for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.”
It’s well below the invasion that happened during the Biden administration but the uptick is cause for concern. For comparison, more than 50,000 inadmissible migrants would arrive at such ports monthly based on U.S. Customs and Border Protection data.
These migrants attempt to work the system and gain easy access into the nation’s interior through quick catch-and-release parole programs.
Under parole programs, illegal migrants are allowed to enter the U.S. under what could be described as “the honor system,” meaning they are temporarily permitted to enter and reside in the U.S. without formal admission.
In most cases, it’s on a short-term basis usually for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit, or they are expected to show up for an immigration hearing and produce the proper documentation.
Mark Morgan served as acting commissioner at CBP during the first Trump administration and told The Washington Times it’s too early to tell what is driving the increase in parolees.
But the surge is something to watch, and cartels and human smugglers are always looking for news ways to circumvent U.S. border security and find loopholes in the immigration system.
“The cartels haven’t simply walked away from a multibillion-dollar human smuggling business. They’re playing the long game, just as they have before,” Morgan told The Washington Times. “Nor will immigrants from across the globe cease to attempt to come to the U.S. if they believe there is the slightest chance they will be granted access into the country and be free from deportation.”
Ports covered by field offices based in New York, Seattle and San Francisco saw the largest number of foreign nationals who arrived without proper papers in January 2026. Almost every field office experienced growth in the number of inadmissibles, the TRAC analysis noted.
Airports are also hubs for other criminal activity such as human smuggling and drug trafficking. Signs for human trafficking are in the women’s bathroom stalls at nearly all major airports.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection border protection recently nabbed two illegal immigrants using fake passports to flee from criminal charges in the United States.
And several foreign nationals have been busted at the Miami International Airport in the last month trying to smuggle drugs out of the country via checked luggage.
Often, immigrants and fraudsters with the financial means will pay more for a safer route into the country. They board a flight using either a legitimate or fake passport and then ditch their real identity so they can claim asylum in the U.S.
They also fly in for birth tourism, a practice where foreign nationals travel to the U.S. to give birth so the child gains citizenship by birthright.
The Biden administration facilitated airborne migration to detract from the influx of illegal migrants at the southern border. At the peak, 30,000 people a month were allowed to fly into airports under special “parole” programs for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans.
The Biden administration’s CBP One parole program—quickly halted by the Trump administration—permitted inadmissible aliens to make an appointment to fly directly to airports in the interior of the United States, bypassing the border altogether.
Other foreign nationals who fall into the category of inadmissibles arrive on temporary student or work visas, but the port officers may have questions about their documentation. They are marked as inadmissible, paroled and told to return with documents to resolve the issues.
Unauthorized migrants from Mexico and Canada have led the recent surge, followed by foreign nationals from India and China, according to TRAC data.
In January, India topped the list of countries with the most people allowed in, followed by Mexico and China.
They typically account for the majority of student visa and temporary work visa applicants, said Andrew “Art” Arthur, a former immigration judge and now a fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies, who also spoke to The Washington Times.
Arthur isn’t concerned by the uptick in inadmissibles at this point.
“That’s a traditional flow, and the system can deal with that,” he said. “It’s 200,000 people at the southwest border we can’t handle.”
