“Illegal border crossings last month were by far the lowest ever recorded. Ever.”

Address to a joint session of Congress (referring to February 2025)

The crossings drop was real and dramatic, but "lowest ever recorded" is false. CBS News rated the claim only partially true: February 2025's roughly 8,450 Border Patrol apprehensions were the lowest since at least fiscal year 2000, the earliest period with publicly available monthly data, not the lowest in history. Border Patrol averaged about 8,000 apprehensions per month as recently as fiscal year 1968, and apprehensions ran lower still in earlier decades.

The decline also began under Biden, not Trump. Illegal crossings had been falling before Trump took office. Trump's policies accelerated an existing downward trend.

Trump could accurately claim crossings hit a multi-decade low, a 25-plus-year record on available monthly data. Instead he reached for an "ever recorded" superlative the historical record contradicts.

He repeated the claim at the Justice Department on March 14, 2025: "In our first full month in office, we achieved the lowest level of illegal border crossings ever recorded."

"The total ... would mark the lowest monthly apprehensions since fiscal year 2000, the earliest period with publicly available monthly data." — CBS News Confirmed fact check, March 5, 2025