How many people from terrorism-sponsoring states enter the U.S. illegally?

Patrol, which is part of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection division of the Homeland Security Department, publishes data on how many of those occur — but not by individual country. According to that information, there were 45,283 arrests of individuals from nations other than Mexico in fiscal 2009 and 50,912 in fiscal 2010 (it appears that Cornyn quoted only the fiscal 2009 number during the hearing.)

In DHS lingo, an “apprehension” is an arrest for being in the United States illegally. The number of people actually detained, however, is smaller because some individuals are arrested more than once, according to a June 2009 fact sheet published by the department’s Office of Immigration Statistics.

As support for the senator’s statement during the 9 March hearing, Cornyn spokesman Drew Brandewie sent the American-Statesman a chart that he said his office had received from Customs and Border Protection. Unlike the Border Patrol’s published data, this chart lists a country-by-country breakdown of arrests “by citizenship” for illegal entry on the southwestern border during fiscal 2009 and the first seven months of fiscal 2010. This is the same time period that Cornyn noted at the 9 March hearing.

The southwestern border data from Cornyn’s chart show that there were 105 apprehensions of Cubans, 10 of Iranians, six of Sudanese, and none of Syrians in fiscal 2009. In the first seven months of 2010, there were 48 apprehensions of Cubans, seven of Iranians, one of Sudanese, and two of Syrians.

All together, the apprehensions from those four countries represent 0.25 percent of the total arrests of non-Mexicans on the southwestern border over the 19-month period, according to Cornyn’s chart (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras alone accounted for 84 percent.)

Add Mexican nationals to the equation, and the percentage shrinks more: According to the numbers in Cornyn’s chart, apprehensions of people from the “state sponsor of terrorism” nations amounted to 0.02 percent of the 540,865 total arrests on the southwestern border in fiscal 2009.

What about the other U.S. border areas? The Border Patrol also apprehends people for illegal entry at the northern border with Canada and in the coastal areas of Puerto Rico, Florida, Louisiana, and other Gulf states. According to 2009 nationwide statistics that newspaper received from the Border Patrol, there were 935 arrests of people from the four “terrorism” nations: 910 of Cubans, 15 of Iranians, six of Sudanese, and four of Syrians. Subtract the 121 apprehensions that took