Border Patrol's Miami sector has emerged as one of the agency's busiest regions for illegal immigrant arrests as the Trump administration's immigration enforcement efforts increasingly focus on the nation's interior, placing South Florida among the agency's top 20 regions for illegal immigrant encounters. 

Between March 2025 and April 2026, U.S. Border Patrol agents apprehended 125,199 foreign nationals across the country's Mexican, Canadian, and coastal borders, according to Customs and Border Protection data.

Of those arrests, 12,599 — about 10% of the national total — occurred within the Miami sector, according to The Washington Examiner on Thursday. 

The increase comes as apprehensions along the U.S.-Mexico border have fallen to historic lows under President Donald Trump, while the Department of Homeland Security has expanded enforcement operations inside the United States.

Unlike regions along the southern border, where Border Patrol agents primarily arrest individuals attempting to enter the country illegally, many of those apprehended in South Florida are first encountered by local or state law enforcement officers and later turned over to federal immigration authorities.

In the past, Florida law enforcement officers who stopped vehicles carrying illegal immigrants were generally unable to transfer those individuals directly to federal agents.

Recent cooperation between state and federal authorities has increased the number of illegal immigrants being referred to Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement for processing and potential removal.

The shift has helped elevate the Miami sector's enforcement activity to levels that now rival some Border Patrol regions in traditional border states, including Texas, Arizona, and California.