Immigration 101

The U.S. immigration system is complex and can be difficult to understand. These resources provide key data points, historical information, and background on hot topics in immigration. Learn the basics about immigration.

Recent Features

Why Don’t Immigrants Apply for Citizenship?

There is no line available for undocumented immigrants and the “regular channels” do not include them.

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Fact Sheet
Temporary Protected Status: An Overview

This fact sheet provides an overview of how Temporary Protected Status designations are made, what benefits TPS confers, and how TPS beneficiaries apply for and regularly renew their status.

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How the United States Immigration System Works

U.S. immigration law is very complex. Here's basic information about how the U.S. legal immigration system is designed.

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All Immigration 101 Content

  • Blog

How America’s Fluid Racial Identities Are Challenging the Assumption of a Declining White Majority

April 1, 2019

For years, politicians, the media, and social scientists have predicted a declining white-majority population in the United States and a not-too-distant future where minorities assume political...

  • Blog

Immigrants Are Regularly Kept Locked up for Months After Deportation Orders

March 27, 2019

When the U.S. government orders that an immigrant in its custody must be deported, the person isn’t supposed to remain incarcerated for long. Yet the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) often...

  • Blog

Making Sense of the Rising Number of Families Arriving at the Border

March 25, 2019

Over the past few months, a new trend has emerged at the U.S.-Mexico border: more families are crossing and presenting themselves to U.S. officials to ask for asylum. But even though the number of...

  • Blog

Immigration Groups Are Using This Tool to Expose Government Secrets

March 15, 2019

Many of the country’s top immigration agencies operate in secret. This lack of transparency in how immigration laws are implemented, administered, and enforced has the potential to devastate the...

  • Blog

Number of Undocumented Immigrants in US at a 25-Year Low

March 1, 2019

  Contrary to President Trump’s claim that “large-scale unlawful migration” across the southern border constitutes a “national emergency” that requires building a wall, research suggests that...

  • Blog

Immigrants Have More Faith in American Institutions Than the Native-Born

February 7, 2019

Despite the fact that immigrants living in and arriving in the United States today are not exactly receiving a warm welcome by key government institutions, a recent poll by the Cato Institute...

  • Blog

Trump’s State of the Union Speech Reflects a Fundamental Misunderstanding of Immigration

February 6, 2019

Speaking before Congress and the nation Tuesday evening, President Trump once again promised bipartisanship and instead delivered division. When it came to immigration, the president neither...

  • Blog

How Trump Can Use Immigration to Make the State of the Union Stronger

February 5, 2019

Immigration will undoubtedly be a central issue during President Trump’s State of the Union address. However, it’s unlikely that any of the proposals the president advances will move us closer to...

  • Blog

USCIS Processing Times Get Even Slower Under Trump

February 4, 2019

The Trump administration has slowed the processing of immigration benefit applications to a crawl, causing needless harm to immigrants, their families, and their employers. Under President Trump,...

  • Blog

More People Overstay Their Visas Than Cross the Border Illegally – Our Immigration Laws Need to Address That

January 23, 2019

New estimates of the undocumented population in the United States confirm a trend that has been apparent for several years: the number of people who become undocumented each year by overstaying...

  • Press Release

Fee Increase for Immigration Applications Is an Attack on Legal Immigration

July 31, 2020
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services—the government agency that administers the country's legal immigration system—is expected to announce Monday major fee hikes for many immigration-related applications and petitions. The increased fees will impact people applying for U.S. citizenship and asylum, as well as American businesses hiring or retaining employees vital to our country’s recovery from a global health and economic crisis.
  • Blog

Trump’s Public Charge Rule Is Blocked Again Over Impact of COVID-19

July 30, 2020

A federal judge in New York has once again put the Trump administration’s “public charge” rule on hold, but only for the duration of the COVID-19 national emergency. This rule, which went into...

  • Advocacy

Statement for the House Committee on Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Citizenship Hearing on "Oversight of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services"

July 29, 2020

The American Immigration Council submitted a written statement to the House Committee on Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration and Citizenship for a July 29, 2020 hearing on "Oversight of U....

  • Blog

Canadian Court Rules US Is No Longer a ‘Safe Third Country’ for Asylum Applicants

July 23, 2020

A Canadian court has ruled that the United States is no longer a country to which the Canadian government could safely return asylum seekers who crossed the U.S-Canada land border.  This upends...

  • Blog

3 Things You Need to Know About Trump’s Unconstitutional Census Executive Order

July 22, 2020

President Trump issued an executive order on June 21 that laid out a plan to violate the U.S. Constitution by excluding undocumented immigrants from the 2020 Census. An accurate census count is...

  • Blog

USCIS Wastes Time and Money With Increased Vetting in Citizenship Processing

July 21, 2020

The Trump administration has justified major changes to citizenship processing to “safeguard” the U.S. immigration system from application fraud. Yet the increased vetting has not lowered the...

  • Press Release

Executive Order to Exclude Millions From the Census Gets It Wrong; All People Must Be Counted

July 21, 2020
President Trump issued an executive order to prevent undocumented immigrants from being counted as part of the 2020 Census. This policy would unlawfully exclude 10.7 million undocumented immigrants, despite the clear requirement of the 14th Amendment to count “the whole number of persons in each state.”
  • Blog

USCIS Upends the Lives of Immigrants by Refusing to Print Their Work Permits and Green Cards

July 15, 2020

Update: On August 3, 2020, a federal court in Ohio granted a temporary restraining order requiring USCIS to print a work permit within 7 days for all individuals who had been approved for one. The...

  • Blog

USCIS Holds Drive-Thru Naturalization Ceremonies to Work Through COVID-19 Backlog

July 13, 2020

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) expects, by the end of July, to have worked through nearly the entire backlog of naturalization oath ceremonies put on hold in response to the...

  • Blog

ICE Says International Students Must Take Classes in Person or Leave the Country

July 7, 2020

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to surge across the United States, many universities have chosen to temporarily move to online-only classes to protect public health. However, new guidance from...

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