New data from Customs and Border Patrol details the terrifying size of the never-ending tsunami of illegal aliens that is crashing against the southern border of the United States.

One frightening number from this immigration invasion?

In fiscal 2019, Customs and Border Protection “has seen a surge in Family Unit Aliens compared to the same time from last fiscal year by 280%. Fiscal Year 2018 was a record year and this year will surpass that if the current trend continues without any legislative fixes. Overall apprehensions between the [ports of entry] are up 81%.”

Many if not most of the migrants will file phony asylum claims, but the sheer number of people isn’t the only problem. Many of the illegals are sick, and when they land in large groups, they provide cover for smugglers to bring in drugs.

Big Numbers, Sick Illegals, Tons of Drugs

Since the government shutdown started, CBP has not posted enforcement data beyond November’s. DHS has released the two batches of December’s.

Since the beginning of fiscal 2019 in October, CBP reported, the number of groups of 100 or more illegals caught at the border has surged. “In the El Paso, Rio Grande Valley, Tucson, and Yuma Sectors over the last four months, smugglers and traffickers have delivered 53 large groups, totaling 8,797 illegal aliens.”

CPB caught 110 illegals scaling the border fence in Yuma sector on Monday, and the week before, apprehended nearly 400 who tunneled under the border barrier there.

Most of those border-jumping illegals, 7,757, are from Guatemala, and most come together as families. That figure is 84.6 percent. Another 11.5 percent are unaccompanied children. And 99.6 percent are from the Northern Triangle of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador.

As the DHS reported in its summary of the new protocols for deporting the illegals, most illegals used to be single Mexican men.

Even worse is the number who need medical care, which, of course, will be free — at least to them.

Border agents have rushed 2,224 illegals to border hospitals since December 22, and spent 19,299 hours supporting those facilities. When agents are running to and from the hospital, and watching the border jumpers while they await care, they aren’t guarding the border.

One example of the problem? On January 15, the day the horde of illegal left Honduras to set out for their shot at the border, border agents collared 247 illegal aliens, 50 of whom needed “immediate treatment/evaluation from a medical professional at a hospital. Transporting 50 individuals to the hospital utilized nearly all available agents, severely limiting their ability to process the large group or respond to other border security duties; thus resulting in increased time in custody, delaying custody transfer coordination, and inhibiting response to other illegal cross-border traffic.”

The other illegal “cross-border traffic” includes drug smugglers who use large groups as a cover to get drugs into the country, CBP reported.

Consider just three days, January 16 through 18. Agents caught 253 illegals and 265 pounds of marijuana the first day, 174 illegals and 705 pounds of cocaine the second day, and 116 illegals and 1,087 of marijuana on day three.

The drug seizures and apprehensions were separate events, but they illustrate the gravity of the situation.

December Apprehensions

The agency also reported that border agents collared 60,782 illegals in December, the third straight month the number exceeded 60,000.

Some 50,753 individuals, 83.5 percent, were caught between ports of entry. Another 10,029 illegals showed up at ports of entry to be declared inadmissible.

Border agents intercepted 27,518 families hopping the border and deemed another 4,383 inadmissible between ports of entry. Agents caught or declared inadmissible 23,682 illegal-alien single adults and 5,121 illegal-alien unaccompanied minors.

Other data demonstrate, again, the staggering dimension of the problem.

CBP has captured an average 31,188 families and unaccompanied children a month this fiscal year, a 136 percent increase from fiscal 2017.

Meanwhile, again, apprehensions of family units in the first quarter of fiscal 2019 — 75,794 — are up 280 percent.

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