Elected officials who want to secure the border need metrics that clearly identify what that means.
But, measuring and defining border security has been problematic.
Texas Public Policy Foundation legislative fellow Igor Magalhaes assessed that a lack of continuity in the metrics and their respective methodologies impede an accurate and holistic historical assessment of border security.
He said it's important to get the best information on how to properly measure border security as quickly as possible.
"First, it's for us to publicly report metrics more expediently, so the American people can hold their elected officials more accountable," said Magalhaes.
He said when it comes to measuring border security, there are so many unknowns from the physical border differences to legislative problems, it's hard to get quantitative data to correctly analyze border security.
"And, then we can go to our elected officials and be like, 'Hey, look, we're not doing the proper job of the sovereign nation of protecting our borders, and you've got to do something about it," said Magalhaes.
He said comprehensive border security is more than just apprehending illegal border crossers. It also requires the ability to turn them back and deter them from attempting again in the future.