Immigration News Resources

The U.S. Supreme Court published a new decision on March 4 that will make it harder—if not impossible—for many longtime immigrants to fight deportation. The case, Pereida v. Wilkson, abandons decades of Supreme Court precedent on the immigration consequences of criminal convictions. Undocumented immigrants and other noncitizens who are deportable may still be eligible for […]

The post The Supreme Court Makes It Harder for Immigrants to Fight Deportation appeared first on Immigration Impact.

Individuals hoping to become a naturalized American citizen will take a different civics test beginning this week, as U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) reverts back to a previous version of the test. USCIS has scrapped a 2020 version of the U.S. citizenship test implemented during the final months of the Trump administration. The test […]

The post Trump’s Citizenship Test Scrapped by USCIS Over Politicization and Complexity Concerns appeared first on Immigration Impact.

AILA member Yasmin Blackburn, who chairs the CT chapter's Diversity & Inclusion Committee, shares her life experience and why Black History recognition should not be limited to one month a year but celebrated year-round.

The U.S. government has long relied on a punitive and outdated detention system to keep immigrants in its custody. Even when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) places people on alternatives to detention, those alternatives are run by for-profit corporations and involve intrusive surveillance through devices like ankle monitors. New data released this week by […]

The post New Data Shows the Landscape of Community Support Services to Replace Immigration Detention appeared first on Immigration Impact.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced last week that it would make changes to two family detention centers in Texas that would result in families spending less time in detention. The agency states that the facilities will be turned into “reception centers,” where families receive COVID-19 tests, arrange travel to their destination, and are […]

The post ICE’s Changes to Family Detention Are an Improvement but Don’t Go Far Enough appeared first on Immigration Impact.

About 400,000 U.S. immigrants from 10 countries currently have TPS, which offers a reprieve from deportation.

The post Immigrants with Temporary Protected Status could be offered a path to U.S. citizenship appeared first on Pew Research Center.

The stakes in immigration court could not be higher—many people face the possibility of being permanently torn away from their families and communities in the United States. Others seeking protection in the U.S. risk being forced back to dangerous conditions in their home countries. Despite these extraordinarily high stakes, immigrants are not entitled to publicly […]

The post A Federal Defender System for Immigrants Is Long Overdue appeared first on Immigration Impact.

President Biden has ended a 10-month ban on immigrant visas—the COVID-19 immigrant visa ban. The Trump administration issued the ban in April 2020 in the name of “protecting” American jobs during the economic crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The real purpose was not to provide any meaningful economic benefit, but to achieve the largescale […]

The post President Biden Ends Part of Trump’s Ban on Legal Immigration appeared first on Immigration Impact.

Kamala Harris embodies trends that have been unfolding over recent decades. As a result, many Americans can see themselves in her story.

The post In Vice President Kamala Harris, we can see how America has changed appeared first on Pew Research Center.

Over the past year, sweeping orders have banned many non-immigrant visa holders from entering the United States. The COVID-19 pandemic gave many former Trump administration officials the opportunity to restrict immigration based on fears surrounding the spread of the coronavirus and U.S. unemployment and immigration. The extended executive order—in effect until March 31—has consequently kept […]

The post What Are the Benefits of the J-1 Visa? appeared first on Immigration Impact.

As part of the Diversity & Inclusion blog post series, Christine Alden shares her personal experience as a student and graduate of an HBCU, along with some of the history around her alma mater, the Thurgood Marshall School of Law at Texas Southern University.

Why has immigration become such a heated issue for those on the right and the left? It’s because many Americans have—without realizing it—sacralized their values and beliefs associated with immigration. This explains in part why the debate has become uncompromising and moralized. What can we do about it? Answers can be found in a new […]

The post Why Has Immigration Become Such a Divisive Issue? appeared first on Immigration Impact.

AILA member Ruth McChesney offers some useful tips about how she regularly reviews financial information to inform her understanding of her firm's productivity and previews the practice management track at the upcoming AILA MidWinter Conference

For years, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has taken a harsh, punitive approach that has ripped families and communities apart. The Trump administration’s approach was particularly cruel and xenophobic, resulting in the highest detention numbers the United States has ever seen. ICE’s new enforcement priorities hopefully signal an important turn from the hate-driven enforcement […]

The post New ICE Enforcement Priorities Represent an Important Shift, But More Change Is Needed appeared first on Immigration Impact.

In this blog post, AILA members and CLINIC attorneys Vickie Neilson and Jonathan Langer describe how the Trump administration's midnight rulemaking has harmed clients, including one rule that prevents judges from reopening old removal orders.

The Second Circuit has found that the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) must publish immigration decisions, reversing an earlier federal district court decision. The case challenged the Department of Justice’s longstanding practice of failing to publish immigration decisions by the BIA—the highest administrative court deciding immigration cases—in any forum that could be easily accessed by […]

The post In a Win for Transparency, Court Orders Board of Immigration Appeals to Make Immigration Court Decisions Public appeared first on Immigration Impact.

Just days before it was due to take effect, the Biden administration has struck down a last-minute deal made between the Trump administration and the union for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). The agreement would have given ICE’s union the authority to veto President Biden’s immigration enforcement policies. The union—which endorsed Trump for president […]

The post DHS Strikes Down Trump Deal with ICE Union, Paving the Way for Biden’s Changes to Immigration Enforcement appeared first on Immigration Impact.

Helena Tetzeli, member of the AILA Media Advocacy Committee, shares insights into what the Administrative Procedure Act is and how it impacts implementation or revocation of immigration policy changes.

The Trump administration sent over 70,000 people who came to the U.S border seeking asylum back to Mexico to wait for court hearings. This so-called “Migrant Protection Protocols” (“MPP”) program placed people in serious danger and made it nearly impossible for anyone to win protection. Court hearings under MPP were indefinitely suspended in March 2020. […]

The post Biden Administration Unveils Plan to Process Asylum Seekers Subject to the Migrant Protection Protocols appeared first on Immigration Impact.

At least 76 of the voting members of the 117th Congress are foreign born or have at least one parent born in another country.

The post Immigrants and children of immigrants make up at least 14% of the 117th Congress appeared first on Pew Research Center.