1. From the article:

> During the first nine months of fiscal 2026 (October through June), authorities recorded 1,509 encounters, down from 10,291 during the same period in fiscal 2023, a decline of about 85 percent.

10k was the number recorded 3 years ago, it's been down significantly regardless of whether a wall exists or not.

2. These numbers aren't specific to Big Bend NP itself but rather to the much larger Big Bend Sector (the border contained within the park is but ~22% of these 517 miles [1]):

>The figures cover the entire Big Bend Sector, which is wider than the park itself and spans roughly 517 miles of the border.

There are no figures as to how many of the people recorded illegally crossing even used the NP part of Big Bend Sector.

Add to that the fact that the NP terrain is far more difficult to walk through than the surrounding sector and it's quite easy to see that the number of recorded illegal crossing from within the NP itself are likely to at least an order of magnitude smaller than these figures.

[1] - https://home.nps.gov/bibe/planyourvisit/border_travel.htm