A record-high 120 million people are displaced from their homes across the globe at a time when more people than ever before are arriving at the United States’s southern border from far-away countries.

Organizations that assist refugees, asylum-seekers, and migrants warned on Thursday, World Refugee Day, that global displacement figures have more than doubled over the past decade and increased by 10 million since 2023. 

Republicans have attributed a spike in border crossings to President Joe Biden’s repeal of Trump-era policies, including “Remain in Mexico,” though Democrats blame factors such as gang violence and economic conditions in migrants’ home countries, traditionally those in Mexico and South America.

But to explain the jump in illegal immigration from countries as far-flung as India and China, experts have cited everything from advances in technology to the displacement caused by war.

Since Biden took office in 2021, nearly 10 million migrants have been encountered attempting to enter the U.S. from abroad — more people than any period in history.

Migration to the US

Migration to the U.S. by way of the southern border is just one way that non-U.S. citizens seek admission in addition to entering on visas or other lawful pathways.

Illegal immigration by walking across the southern border has for decades largely consisted of Mexican men seeking work.

“Until 2012, over 85 percent of migrants whom Border Patrol apprehended were citizens of Mexico,” according to a report authored by Adam Isacson of human rights group Washington Office on Latin America.

In the 2000s and early 2010s, changes in court rulings and U.S. law prompted more unaccompanied children and families from Mexico, as well as northern Central America, to travel to the U.S.

Following a virtual halt in migration globally during the pandemic, international travel restrictions were lifted and many more people finally had a chance to leave their home country.

Migrants, as well as people who facilitate human smuggling, have increasingly used technology, such as messaging apps, to advertise and communicate about travel routes.

From fiscal year 2020 to 2022, the number of migrants encountered skyrocketed. The jump was due to major increases within certain countries whose citizens have not historically been encountered in high numbers trying to cross the southern border.

Cubans jumped from 13,410 in 2020 to 220,908 in 2022; Venezuela from 2,787 to 187,716; Ukraine from 93 to 25,364; India from 1,120 to 18,308; and Russia from 467 to 21,763.

Relief groups, including the International Rescue Committee, have detailed how a warming climate has led to displacement in continents such as Africa, where agriculture is more heavily reliant on rain, while longer mosquito-breeding seasons in the Asia Pacific raise the likelihood of dengue and other diseases.

Regional wars, meanwhile, have compounded the challenges stemming from natural disasters and issues like poverty.

The conflict in Sudan has displaced 12 million people, making it the greatest single-country displacement. The Israel-Gaza war is now in its eighth month, and roughly 3-in-4 of the 2.3 million residents in the region have been displaced.

The U.S. response

While the change in migration patterns is clear, the federal government is focused on responding rather than planning, according to Theresa Cardinal Brown, senior adviser on immigration for the Bipartisan Policy Center.

For example, while the Border Patrol has responded to the record number of illegal immigrant arrests by putting up tents to detain people temporarily in more suitable conditions, the government has made little strides in addressing pull factors that draw migrants who would otherwise travel to closer countries.

The Biden administration’s focus on resolving the “push” factors that prompt people from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras to migrate to the U.S. also needs to be addressed, Brown said in a previous interview. Otherwise, Central American migration will drop, but global migration to the U.S. will continue to rise.

“What about Nicaragua? What about Brazil and Venezuela? What about Haiti? What about Ukraine and Romania? And Congo. What are the root causes there? How are you going to manage that?” Brown said.

David Miliband, president and CEO of the IRC, said the private sector, nonprofit groups, and governments ought to band together to address the growing issue.

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Although the White House has vowed to admit 125,000 refugees annually, the situation at the southern border has shown a huge demand for additional help, according to Miliband.

“It is an equity crisis: 75% of the world’s displaced are not hosted in the West but in low and middle-income countries. It is a crisis of the rule of law: the failure to uphold peace and security, and growing ferocity and impunity in conflict has meant the average number of civilians forced to flee their homes per year is now double the average of the past 25 years,” said Miliband in a statement. “And it is a crisis of responsibility, as we face an historic $40 billion humanitarian funding gap, telling of governments in retreat from the world stage.”