Immigration, immigrats and the Southern Border

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? More Americans approve of immigration

Data: Gallup. (Percentages who said the effects are "mixed" or don't have an opinion aren't shown.) Chart: Axios Visuals Americans' attitudes toward immigration have softened in the past year, Axios' April Rubin writes from a new Gallup report. The share of Americans who said they want less immigration dropped to 30%, down from a high of 55% last year. A significant majority — 79% — of respondents said immigration is a "good thing" for the U.S. today. The share who said it's a "bad thing" dropped from 32% last year to 17% this year. Explore the data ...

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Photo: AFP via Getty Images ? Above: Workers erect a new phase of border wall yesterday between Santa Teresa, N.M., and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.

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Illegal immigration hit a record-high of 14 million in the US in 2023, Pew report finds

The number of people in the United States illegally surged to an all-time high of 14 million in 2023, a research group said Thursday, a major increase that still falls well short of estimates from President Donald Trump and some critics of immigration. Read more.

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? Stat du jour: 1.4 million immigrants

Illustration: Lindsey Bailey/Axios

About 1.4 million immigrants have left the U.S. amid President Trump's crackdown, Axios' Emily Peck writes from a new tally by Pew Research. Why it matters: It's the first time America's immigrant population has fallen in decades. The U.S. Census Bureau's Current Population Survey finds that in June, the foreign-born population was 51.9 million — down from the peak in January (53.3 million), when immigrants were a record 16% of the population. Most of the drop "is likely due to a fall in the unauthorized immigrant population," Pew says. Keep reading.

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Largest detention center in history

This Aug. 7 satellite image shows large white tents for a new immigrant detention center at Fort Bliss, Texas. Photo: Planet Labs via AP Spotted in the desert: A new immigration detention center recently opened at Fort Bliss, an Army base in Texas. The tent city can already house nearly 1,000 adults. The Trump administration says it will ultimately hold 5,000 adults, the largest such complex in U.S. history, NBC reports. The White House awarded a contract worth up to $1.2 billion to build and operate the facility. "More than 80 years ago, the base was an official U.S. Army facility that was used as a temporary internment camp, holding nationals from Japan, Germany and Italy," Derrek Tomine, president of the National Japanese American Historical Society, told NBC. A migrant detention facility, dubbed Alligator Alcatraz, in the Florida Everglades in July. Photo: Rebecca Blackwell/AP ⚖️ Separately, a judge ruled late yesterday that "Alligator Alcatraz" must shut down by October and will likely be empty within days, according to emails shared with AP. The hastily built immigration detention center in the heart of the Florida Everglades has been plagued by reports of unsanitary conditions and civil rights violations.

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A judge blocks the deportation of Guatemalan children already waiting on the tarmac to be sent back

HARLINGEN, Texas (AP) — With migrant children waiting on tarmacs to be sent to their native Guatemala, a federal judge Sunday temporarily blocked the flights, siding with attorneys for the children who said the government was breaking laws and sending their clients to potential peril.

https://apnews.com/article/immigration-unaccompanied-children-trump-deportations-guatemala-3790909d69f19fd8cd8edffb6b3215c3?

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California revokes 17,000 commercial driver’s licenses for immigrants California is revoking 17,000 commercial driver’s licenses given to immigrants after discovering the expiration dates went past when the drivers were legally allowed to be in the U.S., state officials said Wednesday. Read more.

Why this matters: The announcement follows harsh criticism from the Trump administration about California and other states granting licenses to people in the country illegally. The issue was thrust into the public’s consciousness in August, when a tractor-trailer driver not authorized to be in the U.S. made an illegal U-turn and caused a crash in Florida that killed three people.   Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Wednesday that California’s action to revoke these licenses is an admission that the state acted improperly even though it previously defended its licensing standards. Governor Gavin Newsom’s office said that every one of the drivers whose license is being revoked had valid work authorizations from the federal government.    The new rules for commercial driver’s licenses that Duffy announced in September make getting them extremely hard for immigrants because only three specific classes of visa holders will be eligible. Only 10,000 of the 200,000 noncitizens who have commercial licenses would qualify for them.

RELATED COVERAGE ➤ ‘A day without fear': Chicagoans buy out street vendors amid immigration crackdown   Judge signals hundreds of people detained in Chicago immigration crackdown could be released on bond

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As border dynamics change, priest keeps ministering to migrants and deportees  Over the past five years, the Rev. Brian Strassburger has gone from ministering to throngs of asylum-seekers in overcrowded shelters at the U.S.-Mexico border to celebrating Mass with detained and deported migrants. Despite the drastic changes, the Jesuit priest says his mission remains centered on a Christian message “that God is accompanying you on your journey.” Read more.

Why this matters: Based in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, Strassburger heads the Del Camino Jesuit Border Ministries, a trio of Jesuits who have been providing Mass and other sacraments to migrants on both sides of the U.S.-Mexican border since 2021.    Back then, thousands of migrants crammed into bare-bones shelters daily before and after crossing the border in record numbers. Nearly 2.5 million people crossed the border from May 2023 until January 2025, when President Donald Trump declared a national emergency at the border at the start of his second term.    With the ongoing immigration crackdown, Strassburger has been focusing on celebrating regular Masses at two large Texas detention centers as well as in shelters in Mexico.

RELATED COVERAGE ➤ Faith leaders push for access to ICE detention centers during Lent and Ramadan  Faith leaders prep for border changes amid tension, hope  Border app that became ‘a salvation’ for migrants to legally enter the US may end