Independent New Hampshire Journalism · Northfield, NHNew Hampshire has 58 miles of border and a few dozen apprehensions. The agency’s legal reach runs 100 miles, and a state court once ruled against how it was used.
In the four fiscal years from 2021 through 2024, the U.S. Border Patrol recorded 48 apprehensions on New Hampshire’s border with Canada. It recorded one more in the first weeks of fiscal 2025, for 49 in all. In fiscal 2024 alone, the sector that includes New Hampshire recorded 19,773. The state’s share that year was 23, about one in every 860.
The New Hampshire figures are Customs and Border Protection records reported by WMUR in November 2024. The sector figure is from a February 2026 report by the Government Accountability Office. This report, the sixth in a GSR series on law enforcement, sets out what the Border Patrol may do, how big it is, what it does in New Hampshire, and who checks it.
The short version: New Hampshire has 58 miles of international border, a quiet stretch of the busiest northern sector. The agency’s legal reach runs much farther south than the border does. And the state has paid for its own border patrols, which have reported almost no immigration activity.
Related coverage. GSR’s profile of ICE covers the 31 New Hampshire police agencies that have signed immigration agreements, the State Police among them. GSR’s profile of the U.S. Marshals Service covers the county jails that hold federal prisoners.
Where it came from
The Border Patrol is 102 years old. Its parent agency’s history dates it to May 28, 1924, and the Labor Appropriation Act of that year, with a force that grew to 450 officers in its early years. On March 1, 2003, it became part of U.S. Customs and Border Protection in the new Department of Homeland Security.
The division of labor matters for what follows. Customs officers work the ports of entry, the official crossings. The Border Patrol works everything between them.
How big it is now
The Washington Examiner reported in June 2026, citing the agency, that the Border Patrol had 21,471 agents, the most in its history. Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told Senate appropriators on June 2, 2026, that the fiscal 2027 request for all of Customs and Border Protection was $18.5 billion.
As with ICE, the regular budget is not the whole of it. The Secure America Act of June 10, 2026, set aside $9.55 billion to hire and equip Border Patrol agents and support staff, and another $13.02 billion for the parent agency’s immigration enforcement, all available through September 2029.
Very little of the force is on the northern border. The GAO counted 1,948 agents on board in the eight northern sectors at the end of fiscal 2024, against 2,512 authorized. That is 78 percent staffing. The southwest border was at 90 percent.
What an agent can do
Congress wrote “reasonable distance.” The number 100 comes from a regulation, and the regulation lets a chief patrol agent fix a shorter distance. The 25-mile clause is narrower. It covers private land, and it stops at the door of a home. In New Hampshire the agency has operated far from Pittsburg.
It did so in Woodstock. According to the ACLU’s account of the case, the Border Patrol ran checkpoints on Interstate 93 there, about 90 driving miles from the border. After an August 2017 checkpoint, 16 people were charged with minor drug possession. In May 2018 the Plymouth Circuit Court found that the checkpoint’s main purpose was finding drugs, ruled it unconstitutional under state and federal law, and threw out the evidence. The state dropped the charges. A federal lawsuit followed in 2020 and settled in May 2023, with the Border Patrol agreeing not to operate the Woodstock checkpoint until January 1, 2025. That date has passed.
The half nobody films
The northern border is long, wet, and thinly equipped. The GAO puts it at almost 4,000 miles, about 2,400 of them water. When its auditors surveyed the 49 northern stations, 35 reported too few agents and 28 reported radio problems.
The sector that covers New Hampshire had specific gaps. Its communications center was not fully staffed, and a support job the report singles out, law enforcement information systems specialist, was 57 percent filled. It had no counter-drone system as of March 2025. Its Champlain station lacked room to process and hold people, so the sector used local jail agreements. And agents in Maine’s sector, the report says, must drive detainees to Vermont or New Hampshire, because Maine has no ICE detention facility.
The sector’s own curve is steep. The GAO’s table shows 1,563 apprehensions in fiscal 2019, 413 in 2021, 7,265 in 2023, and 19,773 in 2024. For the first half of fiscal 2025 the report gives two figures, 4,832 in one place and 4,096 in another, and does not reconcile them.
Then the traffic vanished. The sector recorded 3,310 apprehensions in June 2024, its record. In June 2025 it recorded 119, according to figures the sector’s chief posted and a Burlington television station reported.
The Border Patrol in New Hampshire
New Hampshire belongs to the Swanton Sector, headquartered in Swanton, Vermont. The sector covers all of Vermont, part of northern New York, and three New Hampshire counties: Coos, Grafton, and Carroll. Its easternmost station is in Beecher Falls, Vermont. That station is responsible for 78 miles of boundary, the most of the sector’s eight. New Hampshire’s portion of the border is 58 miles.
The numbers on those 58 miles are small enough to list. The records WMUR reported show six apprehensions in fiscal 2021, three in 2022, 16 in 2023, and 23 in 2024.
The state built its own response anyway. The Northern Border Alliance, a state-funded program of overtime patrols by State Police and North Country departments, reports to the governor twice a year. Its report for the second half of 2025, as described by InDepthNH, counted almost 600 stops and contacts and six arrests, none for immigration offenses. It reported no immigration apprehensions and one assist to the Border Patrol. The program had $925,529 available. The report before it counted 2,822 contacts, 10 arrests, and seven assists, with about $756,000 spent in the fiscal year. Those arrests were for offenses such as night hunting, drunk driving, and suspended registrations.
The terrain is part of the story. When Sen. Jeanne Shaheen met Border Patrol officials in Pittsburg in September 2023, her office described the town as remote, with limited communications technology. The GAO found the same problem along the whole northern border: seven of its eight sectors reported gaps in cellular coverage.
Who checks it
The GAO is the steadiest check, and its findings are not flattering. In 2019 it told the Border Patrol to develop a way to measure whether it is securing the northern border between the ports. In testimony on June 30, 2026, it said that recommendation was still not fully carried out. The agency says a “Northern Border Index” will start in fiscal 2027. Until then, the Border Patrol has no finished yardstick for the border New Hampshire sits on.
Courts are the other check, and in New Hampshire the one that mattered was a state court. A circuit judge in Plymouth, applying the state constitution alongside the federal one, ruled the Woodstock checkpoint unconstitutional. The federal case that followed ended in a settlement, not a ruling.
The department’s internal complaint offices are smaller than they were. As GSR’s ICE profile reported, the department’s civil rights office went from more than 150 employees to a planned 20 or so.
What the record does not show
The New Hampshire apprehension figures stop in November 2024. GSR did not locate a public count for the rest of fiscal 2025 or for fiscal 2026. This report did not establish how many agents are assigned to Beecher Falls, or whether the Border Patrol has run a checkpoint in New Hampshire since the Woodstock bar lapsed.
Those are records questions. The federal ones go to Customs and Border Protection under the Freedom of Information Act. The state ones, including every Northern Border Alliance report and what the patrols cost, go to the Department of Safety under RSA 91-A, the Right-to-Know Law, which gives every person the same right to ask.
The Border Patrol’s footprint in New Hampshire is one station in another state, 58 miles of woods, and a few dozen apprehensions in four years. Its authority reaches a good deal farther than its caseload. The last time it used that reach on Interstate 93, a New Hampshire judge ruled against it. The agreement that kept it from coming back has run out.
Your Turn
Poll: Should New Hampshire keep paying for its own Northern Border Alliance patrols?
A) Yes, as is · B) Yes, but scaled back · C) No · D) Not sure
Vote in the Your Voice poll under this article, or send your answer to granitestatereport@gmail.com.
Survey: Have you been stopped at a Border Patrol checkpoint or by a border patrol in New Hampshire, or do you live or work near the Pittsburg border? Tell GSR your town, what happened, the year, and whether we may follow up. Nothing is published with your name unless you agree in writing. Take the survey on the site, or send answers to granitestatereport@gmail.com.
Discuss: Should federal agents be able to stop cars 90 miles from the border without suspicion? And what would you want to see in the state’s border patrol reports before the next budget vote? Join the discussion on the site.
Fact check
| # | Claim | Status | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New Hampshire apprehensions: 6 in fiscal 2021, 3 in 2022, 16 in 2023, 23 in 2024, 1 in fiscal 2025 to date; 49 in all. About 58 miles of the sector is New Hampshire’s border. | ATTRIBUTED | WMUR, Nov. 22, 2024, reporting U.S. Customs and Border Protection records |
| 2 | 48 for fiscal 2021 through 2024; New Hampshire’s fiscal 2024 share about one in 860. | ATTRIBUTED | GSR computation (6+3+16+23; 19,773 divided by 23) |
| 3 | Swanton Sector apprehensions: 1,563 (FY2019), 822, 413, 1,134, 7,265, 19,773 (FY2024); the most of any northern sector; two unreconciled figures for the first half of FY2025. | VERIFIED | GAO-26-107501, Feb. 12, 2026 |
| 4 | Northern sectors: 2,512 agents authorized and 1,948 on board at the end of FY2024, 78 percent, against 90 percent on the southwest border; almost 4,000 miles, about 2,400 water; 35 of 49 stations reported too few agents and 28 radio problems. | VERIFIED | GAO-26-107501 |
| 5 | Swanton: information systems specialist positions 57 percent filled; communications center not fully staffed; no counter-drone system as of March 2025; Champlain station short of processing and holding space, with local jail agreements used; Houlton agents drive detainees to Vermont or New Hampshire. | VERIFIED | GAO-26-107501; GAO-26-109195 |
| 6 | Border Patrol established May 28, 1924, under the Labor Appropriation Act; early force of 450; part of CBP since March 1, 2003. | VERIFIED | U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Border Patrol History |
| 7 | 21,471 agents in spring 2026, the most in the agency’s history. | ATTRIBUTED | Washington Examiner, June 25, 2026, citing CBP |
| 8 | Fiscal 2027 request for CBP: $18.5 billion in net discretionary authority. | ATTRIBUTED | Statement of Secretary Markwayne Mullin, Senate Appropriations subcommittee, June 2, 2026 |
| 9 | Secure America Act: $9.55 billion for Border Patrol agents and support staff; $13.02 billion for CBP immigration enforcement; available through Sept. 30, 2029. | VERIFIED | Public Law 119-98 |
| 10 | Warrantless boarding and search of vehicles within a reasonable distance of the boundary; access to private lands, but not dwellings, within 25 miles. | VERIFIED | 8 U.S.C. § 1357(a)(3) |
| 11 | Reasonable distance means within 100 air miles, or a shorter distance fixed by the chief patrol agent. | VERIFIED | 8 C.F.R. § 287.1(a)(2) |
| 12 | Woodstock checkpoints on I-93 about 90 driving miles from the border; 16 people charged after August 2017; May 2018 Plymouth Circuit Court ruling that the checkpoint was unconstitutional under state and federal law, with evidence suppressed and charges dismissed; federal suit August 2020; May 2023 settlement barring the Woodstock checkpoint until Jan. 1, 2025. | ATTRIBUTED | ACLU of Vermont, Drewniak v. CBP case page (the plaintiff’s counsel’s account) |
| 13 | Swanton recorded 3,310 apprehensions in June 2024, its record, and 119 in June 2025. | ATTRIBUTED | WFFF Burlington, Aug. 7, 2025, citing the chief patrol agent’s post |
| 14 | Swanton Sector covers Vermont, parts of New York, and Coos, Grafton and Carroll counties; eight stations; Beecher Falls, Vermont, covers 78 miles of boundary, the most. | VERIFIED | U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Swanton Sector page |
| 15 | Northern Border Alliance, July to December 2025: almost 600 stops and contacts, six arrests, no immigration apprehensions, one assist to Border Patrol, $925,529 available. | ATTRIBUTED | InDepthNH, Jan. 21, 2026, describing the Department of Safety’s report |
| 16 | Northern Border Alliance, January to June 2025: 2,822 contacts, 10 arrests for offenses including night hunting, drunk driving and suspended registrations, seven assists; about $756,000 spent in the fiscal year. | ATTRIBUTED | InDepthNH, July 18, 2025 |
| 17 | Pittsburg is remote with limited communications technology; the sector includes 58 miles of New Hampshire border; seven of eight northern sectors reported cellular gaps. | VERIFIED | Office of Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, Sept. 8, 2023; GAO-26-107501 |
| 18 | GAO’s 2019 recommendation on northern border performance measures is not fully implemented; a Northern Border Index is expected in fiscal 2027; DHS agreed with the recommendations. | VERIFIED | GAO-26-109195, June 30, 2026 |
| 19 | The DHS civil rights office went from more than 150 employees to a planned 20 or so. | ATTRIBUTED | Federal News Network, January 2026, as reported in GSR’s ICE profile |
| 20 | No New Hampshire apprehension count after November 2024 was located; Beecher Falls staffing and any checkpoint since Jan. 1, 2025, were not established. | ATTRIBUTED | GSR review of the documents listed in Sources; an absence of located evidence, not proof that none exists |
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granitestatereport@gmail.com · 603-931-9264
Editor’s note. Every factual claim above was checked against the sources listed; see the fact-check table. Fiscal 2027 figures are requests to Congress, not enacted appropriations. The New Hampshire apprehension figures end in November 2024 and come from agency records reported by a television station. The account of the Woodstock checkpoint case is the plaintiff’s lawyers’. GSR did not ask Customs and Border Protection or the Department of Safety for comment before publication. The audio narration is a synthetic voice. Featured photograph: a Swanton Sector Border Patrol agent on the Canadian border near Richford, Vermont, August 19, 2025; CBP photo by Jerry Glaser. It is not from New Hampshire. Corrections: Granite State Report corrects verified errors promptly and appends a note identifying what changed and when.
