Del Rio border area remains focal point as crossings drop sharply
Crossings in the Del Rio sector have fallen to about 32 a day, even as federal wall and barrier projects continue around Eagle Pass and Del Rio.
Del Rio and the surrounding Val Verde County border corridor were still drawing attention Thursday as U.S. Border Patrol’s Del Rio Sector remained far quieter than it was during the 2021 surge. Border Patrol officials said encounters in the sector had dropped from roughly 4,000 a day to about 32 a day in 2026, a steep decline in the same area that once became one of the most visible flashpoints in the country.
The Del Rio Sector covers 245 miles of the Rio Grande and Lake Amistad and spans about 55,063 square miles in Texas, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. That stretch of border was the scene of a mass-migration event from Sept. 8 to Sept. 24, 2021, near the Del Rio International Bridge, which CBP described as the largest mass migration event in recorded U.S. Border Patrol history. Reporting at the time said about 15,000 migrants gathered in Del Rio at one point, with more than 5,000 still under the bridge on Sept. 23, 2021.
Even as crossings have fallen, the federal government has kept investing in border infrastructure in the Del Rio area. In late 2025, the Department of Homeland Security and CBP announced new border-barrier contracts that included projects in the Del Rio Sector, among them work tied to primary wall construction and waterborne barriers in the Eagle Pass and Del Rio area. One contract, the Del Rio 3 Project, called for about 22 miles of primary border wall system and about 13 miles of detection technology.
Local operations have also changed. Texas quietly shuttered the Val Verde Temporary Processing Facility in Del Rio in August 2025 after it sat empty for months, ending a booking and processing site that had been used for Operation Lone Star.
Val Verde County’s official website lists County Judge Lewis Owens and Commissioners Kerr Wardlaw, Juan Carlos Vazquez, Fernando Garcia, and Gustavo “Gus” Flores, a reminder that county government is continuing routine operations even as the border landscape around Del Rio has shifted sharply from the crisis levels seen in 2021.
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