Enforcement

Do undocumented immigrants pay taxes?

Undocumented Immigrants play a crucial role in the U.S. economy, not only through their labor but also through substantial tax contributions that support public services and government programs.

  • In 2022, households led by undocumented immigrants paid $75.6B in total taxes. This includes:
    • $29.0B in state and local taxes
    • $46.6B in federal taxes
  • In 2022, approximately 4.5% of the U.S. workforce was undocumented.
  • 89.8% of undocumented immigrants are of working age.

Our Map the Impact tool shows the tax contributions of immigrants at the national, state and local level.

Recent Features

All Enforcement Content

October 26, 2015

From Washington, D.C. to San Francisco to Raleigh, the debate over whether local law enforcement officers should be involved in enforcing federal immigration law is back at the fore. In the past...

October 23, 2015

After 9/11, the immigration detention system in the United States began to expand dramatically, with very little in the way of transparency or accountability as to how the system operated or what...

October 21, 2015

Last week, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released a yearly report on the number of use of force incidents. The report stated that use of force incidents by officers and agents were down...

October 19, 2015

The Senate will vote Tuesday on whether to begin debate on Senator David Vitter’s (R-LA) “Stop Sanctuary Policies and Protect Americans Act” (S. 2146). The bill is an enforcement-only approach to...

October 13, 2015

At a time when many states are adopting policies that harness immigrant’s social and economic contributions, elected officials in North Carolina are advancing anti-immigrant legislation that could...

October 9, 2015

This week, the Migration Policy Institute (MPI) released new information about how the top 15 states of residence for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)-eligible youth are either...

October 7, 2015

This week, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released its long-awaited, new National Standards on Transport, Escort, Detention and Search (TEDS), which govern the transfer of individuals in...

October 6, 2015

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) may finally be devoting more of its immigration enforcement resources to deporting people who represent a real threat to public safety. According to a...

September 30, 2015

Justice was served on September 23, when a federal grand jury indicted Border Patrol agent Lonnie Swartz for the second-degree murder of 16-year-old José Antonio Elena Rodríguez in Nogales, Mexico...

September 28, 2015

Related Content: Lack of CBP Accountability in Responding to Complaints of Abuse Deported migrants suffer a range of abuses at the hands of Custom and Border Patrol agents, according to a new Kino...

The American Immigration Council filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with ICE and CBP on October 13, 2017, seeking data on enforcement actions and outcomes since January 2016. With this data, the Council will be able to assess who is being targeted for removal and what the consequences are of the current enforcement framework.
July 9, 2018
Leaders of several immigrant and human rights organizations were invited for the first time under the Trump administration to meet with Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen.
July 2, 2018

Hundreds of thousands of marchers gathered on June 30, 2018 to protest the Trump’s administration policy of family separation. Activists organized nearly 800 marches in all 50 states, from major...

June 27, 2018

The forced separation of children from their parents by U.S. government officials has created a human rights disaster. Children—some just a few months old—continue to be housed in tent cities,...

June 27, 2018
The lawsuit asks the court to compel the agencies to produce family separation documents in response to FOIA requests submitted in April.
This lawsuit seeks to compel government agencies to produce documents regarding family separation policies.
June 25, 2018

After an unprecedented public outcry last week, President Trump signed an executive order signaling an end to the government’s horrific practice of separating immigrant children from their parents...

June 22, 2018

Criticism continues to mount for the Trump administration’s zero-tolerance policy and practice of separating and imprisoning migrant families along the U.S.-Mexico border. While the administration...

June 21, 2018

President Trump signed an executive order on Wednesday in response to public outcry about family separation – a horrific policy that has led to the forced separation of over 2,000 minor children...

June 20, 2018
President Donald Trump signed an executive order today to try to stem criticism of his family separation policy. He has offered an unacceptable alternative: imprisoning mothers and fathers with their children.

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