Border Enforcement

Recent Features

TESTIMONY
Providing Perspective on the Application of Immigration Law at the US Southwest Border

The reality at the U.S. southern border is complicated. Dive into the role and authority of the executive branch and immigration enforcement agencies. 

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FACT SHEET
Rising Border Encounters in 2021: An Overview and Analysis

For generations, the United States has seen periodic cycles of migration. The arrival of high numbers of asylum seekers is a humanitarian protection management challenge, not a security challenge.

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All Border Enforcement Content

  • Blog

The Government Knew It Didn’t Have the Technology to Track Separated Families. It Did So Anyway.

December 4, 2019

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)—the agency responsible for systematically separating thousands of migrant families in the summer of 2018—lacked the technology or mechanisms to record and...

  • Blog

Volunteer Found Not Guilty After Providing Humanitarian Aid to Migrants

November 25, 2019

Over the last decade, the remains of more than 1,600 people have been found in the Arizona desert. Groups like No More Deaths, whose mission is “ending death and suffering in the U.S.-Mexico...

  • Blog

Trump Administration Begins Sending Asylum Seekers to Guatemala

November 20, 2019

In yet another major blow to America’s asylum system, on Wednesday the Trump administration reportedly began sending some asylum seekers from Honduras and El Salvador to Guatemala rather than...

  • Blog

Trump Moves Forward With Seizing Private Land for Border Wall, Offers Landowners $100 for ‘Irrevocable’ Access

November 19, 2019

The Trump administration is preparing to seize private land in Texas to continue construction of the president’s long-promised border wall. According to government officials familiar with the...

  • Blog

‘I Was Denied Access to the Tent Courts Where Asylum Seekers Are Rushed Through a Sham Process.’

November 18, 2019

Nearly 60,000 people seeking asylum in the United States have been returned to Mexico to wait for their U.S. court hearings under the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), also known as the Remain...

  • Blog

Immigration Agencies’ Intrusive Searches of Cell Phones, Laptops Are Ruled Unconstitutional

November 15, 2019

A federal court ruled this week that sweeping policies permitting U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to search personal cell phones,...

  • Blog

What’s Happened to the People Returned to Mexico Under the Migrant Protection Protocols?

November 6, 2019

It’s been nearly a year since the Trump administration announced the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), or the “Remain in Mexico” program. This program forces vulnerable asylum seekers to return...

  • Blog

New Process in El Paso Seeks to Deport Asylum Seekers in Less Than 10 Days

October 28, 2019

The Trump administration began a secretive new asylum process in El Paso, Texas that came to light late last week. It seeks to deter asylum seekers from coming to the United States and to remove...

  • Blog

Privacy Concerns Grow as Federal Immigration Agencies Use More Surveillance Technology

October 24, 2019

Federal immigration officials are beginning to expand their use of surveillance technology to collect information on immigrants. As officials gather more tools in their arsenal—from DNA collection...

  • Blog

The Perils of the Migrant Protection Protocols

October 23, 2019

Rape, violence, kidnapping, and lack of basic health care is, unfortunately, a reality for hundreds of asylum seekers subjected to the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) or “Remain in Mexico”...

  • Blog

The State of Texas is Arresting and Detaining Border Crossers for Trespassing

July 27, 2021

The state of Texas has started a concentrated effort to arrest immigrants who have recently crossed the U.S.-Mexico border. The immigrants are charged with criminal state offenses of trespassing...

  • Letters

Coalition Letter Urges Immediate End to Title 42 Expulsions and Other Deterrence Strategies Against Asylum Seekers

Publication Date: 
June 30, 2021
The American Immigration Council joined a coalition of 105 organizations in expressing alarm over reports that the Biden administration may continue the harmful and unnecessary Title 42...
  • Blog

Biden Will Admit Asylum Seekers Ordered Deported Under Trump’s Migrant Protection Protocols

June 23, 2021

Asylum seekers who were ordered deported for missing their U.S. court hearings under the Trump administration’s so-called Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP)—informally known as the “Remain in...

  • Letters

Council Joins Coalition Letter Expressing Concern Over ICE Family Custody Programs

Publication Date: 
June 21, 2021
The Council joined over 120 organizations in a letter to DHS and ICE calling on the Biden administration to move away from using contractors to hold families in ICE custody, and asks the...
  • FOIA Litigation

Council Sues Immigration Agencies for Records of Enforcement Databases

This Freedom of Information Act lawsuit seeks to uncover information about the databases and systems that Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agencies use in immigration enforcement.
  • Blog

Biden Will Use Border Wall Funding for Safety and Environmental Protections

June 17, 2021

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced on June 11 its plan for funds the Trump administration had planned to use to construct a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. Unspent funds will...

  • Blog

Collecting DNA From Asylum Seekers at the Border Raises Privacy Concerns

June 10, 2021

U.S. Customs and Border Protection is collecting DNA from asylum seekers at the border, recent media reports confirm. This is the latest expansion of DNA collection as part of a program initiated...

  • Press Release

Biden Budget Request on Immigration is a Missed Opportunity for Meaningful Change

May 28, 2021
The Biden administration disclosed today a $54.2 billion budget request for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for fiscal year 2022. The request is is deeply disappointing and a missed opportunity to set immigration enforcement in the United States on a new path.
  • Blog

Government Watchdog Finds Hundreds of Parents Separated by Trump Never Given Opportunity to Reunify

May 27, 2021

The Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General (DHS OIG) recently found that the Trump administration deported as many as 348 parents that had been separated from their children...

  • Blog

It’s Time to End Title 42

May 19, 2021

One policy first created by the Trump administration is responsible for the greatest restriction on access to our immigration system for asylum seekers than any other. It provides no meaningful...

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