Here’s how Trump has remade US immigration policy in just 1 month
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Sarah Matusek Staff writer
What a month.
Donald Trump’s blizzard of immigration policy changes has spanned the borders, the interior, and deportation plans. They’ve largely prioritized security over humanitarian concerns. His government paints unauthorized immigrants as national threats requiring a military response.
This early on, the impact on public safety and the economy remains to be seen. Yet the number of illegal southern border crossings have continued a downward trend. In the interior, fear and confusion in immigrant communities have taken root, keeping adults home from work and children home from school.
Why We Wrote This
President Donald Trump’s first month featured significant change in U.S. immigration policy. The future of the transformation now rests partly with courts.
Mr. Trump is also broadening the scope of whom he could remove. Beyond talk of targeting “the worst” criminals, he’s stripping legal protections from hundreds of thousands of immigrants previously shielded from deportation. In a national ad campaign, the Department of Homeland Security is telling unauthorized immigrants to leave – or, “We will find you, and we will deport you,” said Kristi Noem, the department’s new secretary.
The president has proved that “The crisis that we experienced over the past four years was completely unnecessary, that the border is controllable, that our laws are enforceable,” says Ira Mehlman, media director at the Federation for American Immigration Reform. “He seems to have kept an awful lot of his promises.”
Mr. Trump signed 11 executive actions concerning immigration on his first day. And over his first month, more than 100 immigration policy developments have emerged, reports the Immigration Policy Tracking Project.
Those actions and policies carry risk, says Lucas Guttentag, a Stanford law professor and Yale research scholar who created the tracking project. The administration is trying to “squeeze every last ounce of justice and humanity out of the immigration system,” he says, and doing so “in ways that the courts have found and will find violates the law of the Constitution.”
Some orders were quickly implemented. Others may take time. Lawsuits brought by immigrant advocates may also stall plans, such as Mr. Trump’s attempt to withhold birthright citizenship from children of certain immigrants.
As heads spin from law and policy changes so far, more are expected.
“We’re seeing both immediate changes, but also the laying of the groundwork for future changes,” says Colleen Putzel-Kavanaugh, associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute. She’s seeing a “similar playbook return,” compared to the first Trump term, but implemented faster.
Here’s a look at key developments to date.
The border
• National emergency declared at the southern border. Claiming the sovereignty of the United States is “under attack” with the entry of criminals and drugs, President Trump declared this emergency on Day 1. He directed the military to help obtain control of the border and suspended the entry of “aliens involved in an invasion.”
Mr. Trump took office with the number of Border Patrol encounters – or stops of those crossing illegally – lower than when he left in 2021. Illegal entries along the southern border have fallen since hitting a record high in December 2023.
Border Patrol encounters stood around 47,300 for the month of December. With the U.S. suspending entry, they plummeted in January to 29,100. That is the lowest since May 2020.
Immigrant advocates have sued the government over access to asylum, which U.S. law says immigrants may seek even if they entered illegally.
• Migrant appointments at ports of entry ended. The government stopped the use of an app called CBP One for migrants seeking lawful entry into the U.S. To deter illegal crossings, the Biden administration had encouraged migrants to set up initial appointments at official ports of entry through the app, after which they could be let in and apply for asylum.
Republicans had decried the app’s use as a backdoor for otherwise unauthorized immigrants. Since 2023, over 900,000 people had been let in through the process, CBS News reports.
The interior
• Limits to citizenship blocked by courts. The 14th Amendment has long been interpreted to guarantee U.S. citizenship to virtually all children born here, regardless of their immigration status. Mr. Trump signed an executive order on Day 1 seeking to bar birthright citizenship for children of unauthorized immigrants and those here temporarily. Four courts have so far blocked the order; the government is appealing two of those decisions. If a case challenging the executive order reaches the Supreme Court, it will have the final say.
• Laken Riley Act signed into law. Signed by the president Jan. 29, the law mandates the federal detention of unauthorized immigrants charged with theft and violent crimes in the U.S. The act’s namesake was a Georgia nursing student who was murdered by a Venezuelan man who authorities say had entered illegally and was cited for theft by shoplifting.
• Temporary protections for immigrants revoked. The Trump administration has targeted immigrants who are here without permission. Now, it’s expanding that group by ending temporary deportation relief for others.
That revocation includes ending temporary protected status for many Venezuelans, now set to expire in April. The government says extending their temporary stay in the U.S. is “contrary to the national interest.” He also moved to terminate a separate program, based on a permission to enter called parole, that let in over half a million immigrants. Both temporary statuses have, based on humanitarian grounds, allowed immigrants to live and work in the U.S.
• Refugees barred. Refugees, who are fleeing identity-based persecution, are vetted and approved for protection in the U.S. before they arrive. Now Mr. Trump has suspended refugee resettlement indefinitely. (During his first term, he downsized the program, which the Biden White House then rebuilt.)
“Sanctuary” jurisdictions targeted
There’s no single definition for “sanctuary” cities and states. But the term often implies that officials provide limited cooperation with the federal government on immigration enforcement.
The Department of Justice has said it will cut off funding to such cities and states, and has sued Illinois and Chicago over what it calls unconstitutional interference with federal powers. Another lawsuit against New York takes aim at a state law that allows unauthorized immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses while limiting federal immigration agencies’ access to driver information.
Immigration enforcement publicized
The government has publicized recent operations by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in cities like New York, Chicago, and Denver.
ICE is pursuing arrests of unauthorized immigrants in partnership with other federal agencies. Still, “border czar” Tom Homan has blamed media leaks for hampering plans. ICE initially published daily arrests, but stopped earlier this month.
The White House last week announced that ICE arrested 11,000 “criminals” in an 18-day period. According to a recent estimate, around 13.7 million unauthorized immigrants lived in the U.S. as of mid-2023.
Against the targeted-criminal narrative, the number of immigrants detained by ICE without criminal histories has been rising since inauguration, reports researcher Austin Kocher.
Religious groups and Denver Public Schools, meanwhile, have sued to block ICE enforcement in and around sensitive locations such as churches and schools, which is no longer discouraged by the government. Proponents of the agency say that arrests at such locations are rare, and rather the ability to pursue arrests near such sites makes operations more efficient.
Deportations
• Promised deportation campaign begins. Monthly data on deportations under the Trump administration is not yet available. Yet the government has paved the way for more fast-track deportations. A creation of the Clinton administration, “expedited removal” takes away immigrants’ access to an immigration judge.
• Military involved in deportation flights and detention. Beyond National Guard units stationed at the southern border, the military has also been tapped for costly deportation flights. Those have included military planes to Guatemala, India, and Panama, a country now accepting migrants from places where the U.S. can’t easily send deportees. (Venezuela is also accepting its deported citizens back, reportedly with its own planes.)
Naval Station Guantánamo Bay is being used for migrant detention, which the White House says could hold up to 30,000 such beds. Through photos, the government has publicized the faces of immigrants sent to the detention site, claiming that many are members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, which officials have linked to violent crimes across the U.S.
Family members of those sent to “Gitmo,” however, have refuted alleged Tren de Aragua ties, reports The Washington Post. It’s unclear how ICE is determining such gang membership, though the agency has said indicators include tattoos. Immigrant advocates have sued the Trump administration over detainees’ lack of access to counsel.
