YUMA, AZ — Illegal border crossings in Yuma have dropped by 99% in the last few years, according to CBP, marking a dramatic shift in the state of the border from 2021 through 2024.
During that period, Yuma Mayor Doug Nicholls declared a local emergency, as over the course of three years, more than 250,000 people illegally crossed into the Yuma Sector, more than double the population of Yuma itself.
Now those areas, like where the border wall stops as it meets the Cocopah Reservation, are empty.
"The area we're coming up on, the most crossings we had in Yuma Sector happened in this area. Every day it was super busy," Border Patrol Agent Fidel Cabrera said. "We had hundreds of people turning themselves in, in the morning and evening you'd have hundreds of people gathered there at any given time.”
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He says an incentive to stay in the U.S. while their asylum claims went through the legal process led to more and more people trying to illegally cross the border.
"Basically, we were catching them, and prior to the adjudication of their case, we were releasing them. And setting a future court date, which a lot of them did not go to," Cabrera said.
This process played out repeatedly across the Arizona border. In 2024, near Lukeville, thousands of migrants crossed the border illegally each day.
Days later, they showed me their processing documents after getting street released in Nogales, free to go anywhere in the U.S. until their court dates.
Yuma Chief Justin De La Torre says new policies from the Trump Administration in Washington are causing the drastic drop in border crossings.
"We are applying an immediate consequence, either expedited removal or a prosecution for illegal entry in the United States. The message is out, we're averaging three people a day arrested for our 126 miles of border," De La Torre said.
Some of the stricter polices enacted at the end of the Biden Administration and by the Trump Administration are being challenged by the ACLU in court.
The slowdown doesn't mean a border shutdown. Cross-border commerce remains a huge part of Yuma County's economy. Every day, thousands of people and vehicles pass through the San Luis border crossing.
Ivan Verdugo has been working in the U.S. for five years, saying he hasn't had any issues with stricter border policies impacting his legal work.
"No…in truth, no, it's been very calm," Verdugo said.
Back at headquarters, Chief De La Torre says this balance shows Yuma can be an example for the rest of the country of how border cities are safe and vibrant places to visit and live.
"It all ties to that facilitation of lawful travel, lawful trade, and our ability to detect that dangerous stuff and keep it out of our communities," De La Torre said.
