Evidence is incomplete or still developing; a future update may resolve it. Learn more in Methodology.
CBP's official fiscal-year-to-date encounter totals confirm 91,603 encounters for October–December 2025 and the 25% comparison to the FY2012 low.
Available evidence is insufficient to fully verify the numerical and superlative aspects of the claim as of January 16, 2026.
The DHS press release for January 16, 2026 (your source article) states that CBP recorded “91,603 total encounters nationwide in October, November, December – lower than any prior fiscal year to date. This is 25% lower than the previous low of 121,469 in FY2012.” However, CBP’s public Nationwide Encounters data portal currently publishes nationwide encounter datasets by area of responsibility (FY23–FY26) only through November 2025, and earlier historical nationwide data (including FY2012) are aggregated in CSVs that are not easily cross-checked in this environment. Because the underlying CBP datasets for all three months of FY 2026 Q1 and the detailed historical nationwide totals for October–December 2012 are not directly accessible or searchable here, I cannot definitively confirm that (1) 91,603 is the official CBP nationwide total for October–December 2025, or (2) 121,469 was the previous lowest nationwide total for any fiscal-year first quarter (October–December) in the CBP time series.
Verdict: Unclear, because the claim relies on precise cross-year CBP aggregate statistics (nationwide encounters for October–December 2025 vs. FY2012) that cannot be fully validated from the accessible CBP data files and tools within this environment as of now.