Prosecutions of illegal border crossings under the Biden administration have significantly decreased amid historically high migrant encounters, according to an internal Department of Homeland Security (DHS) memo The Washington Free Beacon obtained.

There were only 2,896 migrants transferred to the U.S. Marshal’s custody in the 2021 fiscal year, compared to 13,213 during the previous fiscal year and 20,604 in fiscal year 2019, according to the memo.

In 2021, border authorities encountered 1,734,686 migrants at the southern border, and encounters in fiscal year 2022 have already exceeded the previous fiscal year’s total, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) statistics.

Jennie Taer//The Daily Caller News Foundation

“The lack of accountability from this administration encourages the worst people flooding our borders, criminals, to keep violating our laws until they finally commit a crime so egregious that the Department of Justice is forced to prosecute,” a senior DHS official told the Free Beacon.

Under Biden, the number of migrants deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has also decreased. In fiscal year 2021, ICE’s Office of Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) deported 59,011 noncitizens, compared to 185,884 deportations of noncitizens during the previous fiscal year.

“The Biden administration is even failing to live up to the extremely low level enforcement bar it has set for itself,” former ICE Director Tom Homan previously told the Daily Caller News Foundation about the deportation numbers under Biden.

The Biden administration has taken steps to reduce ICE’s power, including directing the agency in February 2021 to limit enforcement to the greatest threats to national security, public safety and border security. In June, the directive was lifted by a court ruling, according to CBS News.

Neither DHS nor the White House responded to the DCNF’s requests for comment.