Undocumented immigrants are streaming across our border — how many are terrorists? 

The Biden-Harris administration’s actions on immigration have been “akin to posting a flashing ‘Come In, We’re Open’ sign on the southern border,” according to U.S. District Court Judge T. Kent Wetherell. 

Is he right?  

Illegal border crossings have reached the highest level in the Border Patrol’s 100-year history, averaging 2 million per year. The administration has released more than 5.4 million illegal crossers into the U.S.; in addition, there were 1.9 million reported "gotaways," a statutory term that refers to migrants who are directly or indirectly observed making an unlawful entry but were not apprehended or turned back. 

Illegal crossings have gone down in recent months, but the reduction is due primarily to assistance from the Mexican government, pursuant to a deal between the U.S. and Mexico made at the end of December 2023. The reduction isn’t likely to last, since the deal did not require the administration to stop doing the things that caused the border crisis, which will continue to be a magnet for illegal immigration. The failed Senate border bill would not have done anything about that either.  

Amid all those illegal entries — and those are just the ones we know about — how many are terrorists? According to an Aug. 5, 2024, report from the House Judiciary Committee, the Border Patrol has apprehended 375 undocumented migrants on the Terrorist Watchlist since the beginning of the Biden presidency. People on the watch list are known to be or are reasonably suspected of being involved in terrorist activities. The administration has released 99 of them into the U.S.  

The watch list, however, only includes the names of migrants that American government agencies or participating international partners have had previous contact with. It isn’t a simple matter to determine whether an illegal crosser is on the watchlist; the watchlist has approximately 2.5 million names.  

So far in fiscal 2024, the Border Patrol has encountered tens of thousands of undocumented migrants from countries that could present national security risks, including 2,134 Afghan nationals, 33,347 Chinese nationals, 541 Iranian nationals, 520 Syrian nationals and 3,104 Uzbek nationals.

Nothing is known about the 1.9 million gotaways, and the other 5.4 million crossers did not go through a substantial screening process, such as those required to obtain a visa or other valid entry documents. Consequently, little, if anything, is known about them or their intentions, other than what they choose to say when they are apprehended.  

The administration has paroled almost 500,000 migrants into the U.S. without visas or other valid entry documents through its humanitarian parole program. This program admits up to 360,000 people a year from Haiti, Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba into the U.S. to work or seek asylum. Cuba has been designated as a state sponsor of terrorism. 

The parole program is a critical part of the administration’s strategy to reduce illegal crossings by providing migrants who might make such crossings with a purportedly lawful alternative. The program does include screening to some extent, but it has experienced a serious problem with fraud that caused DHS to suspend it temporarily. 

The program may have superficial appeal, but it seems to me that it is just another scheme to bypass the statutory visa system that Congress established to control immigration. 

Meanwhile, the terrorist threat has increased. 

At a House Judiciary Committee hearing on June 4, 2024, Attorney General Merrick Garland testified that the threat of a terrorist attack in the U.S. has gone up enormously since the October 7 terrorist attack on Israel. In addition, the FBI has been monitoring the threat of a coordinated attack in the U.S. similar to the ISIS-K attack on Crocus City Hall in Moscow, which killed more than 130 people and injured hundreds more.  

With respect to nation-state threats, the governments of China, Russia, Iran and North Korea have become more aggressive. To address their threats, the Justice Department is prosecuting foreign agents who are attempting to undermine the rule of law in the U.S., and the department is combating transnational repression.  

In February, the Justice Department charged seven defendants with terrorism for their trafficking in and selling of Iranian oil. This resulted in the seizure of more than $108 million and 500,000 barrels of fuel that otherwise would have financed the Iranian government’s support of Hamas, Hezbollah and other Iranian-aligned terrorist groups.  

At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Dec. 5, 2023, FBI Director Christopher Wray testified that he saw “blinking lights everywhere,” referring to the type of warning signs the United States missed before the 9/11 attack.  

The October 7 terrorist attack in Israel shows that terrorists are still intent on using violence and brutality to spread their ideologies. Protecting America from terrorism is the FBI’s top priority. 

ISIS and its supporters continue to aggressively promote its hate-fueled rhetoric and is seeking to attract like-minded violent extremists with a willingness to conduct attacks. Al Qaeda also wants to conduct large-scale attacks against the U.S. 

The arrests of individuals in the U.S. who allegedly are linked to Hezbollah’s main overseas terrorist arm, and their intelligence collection and procurement efforts, demonstrate the group’s interest in long-term contingency planning of terrorist attacks in the United States. Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah has threatened to retaliate against the U.S. for the death of IRGC-QF Commander Qasem Soleimani. 

Terrorists may have entered the U.S. already. If they have, they aren’t likely to be identified until they draw attention to themselves by conducting a terrorist strike. 

And if they aren’t already here, it will just be a matter of time before they are — that is, if we continue to let millions of migrants into the country about whom we know little or nothing.

Nolan Rappaport was detailed to the House Judiciary Committee as an Executive Branch Immigration Law Expert for three years. He subsequently served as an immigration counsel for the Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims for four years. Prior to working on the Judiciary Committee, he wrote decisions for the Board of Immigration Appeals for 20 years.