Immigration 101

The enforcement of immigration laws is a complex and hotly-debated topic. Learn more about the costs of immigration enforcement and the ways in which the U.S. can enforce our immigration laws humanely and in a manner that ensures due process.

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July 10, 2017

A recent story from ProPublica has revealed an internal February 2017 memorandum authored by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to its employees about the implementation of recent Executive...

June 27, 2017

Over the past two decades, much of the immigration policy debate has focused on issues related to immigration enforcement. In fact, many argue that “enforcement first”—the notion that we must...

June 23, 2017

The American Immigration Council is proud to announce the winner of the 20th Annual Celebrate America Fifth Grade Creative Writing Contest. This contest encourages educators to incorporate lessons...

June 12, 2017

After debate rocked the Texas State Capitol, Governor Greg Abbott signed the controversial Senate Bill 4 (SB4) in May, which purports to ban sanctuary city policies and gives local police the...

May 30, 2017

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials unveiled their newest “overstay” estimates—the number of people from other countries who remain in the United States after their visas expire—at a...

April 17, 2017

Each year, undocumented immigrants file their tax returns, just like all Americans. They pay federal, state, and local taxes, in addition to income, property, and sales taxes. However, there are...

March 30, 2017

As any reputable economist will tell you, immigrants contribute to the U.S. economy in many ways. Yet the often subtle complexities of immigration economics are largely absent from a March 24...

March 27, 2017

If the Trump administration fulfills its promise to build a “big, beautiful wall” along the entire length of the U.S.-Mexico border, it will be a very costly solution to a problem that no longer...

March 14, 2017

President Trump stated that he has “ordered the Department of Homeland Security to create an office to serve American victims during his Joint Address to congress. The office is called VOICE –...

March 8, 2017

International Women’s Day is an appropriate time to take stock of the many ways in which immigrant women contribute to the labor force of the United States. Some of these contributions are often...

April 26, 2019

The U.S. population is aging quickly. Baby boomers are retiring en masse and Americans are having far fewer children, on average, than any other time in our history. The median age in this country...

April 25, 2019

The White House issued a memo on Monday directing the Secretaries of State and Homeland Security to provide recommendations to reduce visa overstays. The recommendations, which are expected within...

April 18, 2019

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ international field offices provide critical services to Americans living abroad, as well as refugees and other immigrants. But in a supposed effort to...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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