President Trump came into office with an overwhelming mandate to overhaul immigration and border security. In 100 days, he has dramatically upended U.S. immigration policy through sweeping executive orders, lawsuits and an aggressive campaign of raids, detentions and deportations.
The crackdown has catalyzed fear and confusion across migrant communities, sparked street protests and spurred a historic showdown between the executive and judicial branches over the constitutionality and legality of an effort that has raised fundamental questions about due process and freedom of speech.
Trump's supporters strongly support the moves. Some 87% of Republicans approve of the way Trump is handling immigration so far, according to the latest NPR/PBS News/Marist poll.
But the partisan divide on the issue is extreme: The same NPR/PBS News/Marist poll shows that only 11% of Democrats, and about a third of independents, approve of his immigration actions.
NPR has carefully tracked the biggest immigration stories, policy changes and legal challenges. Here are the top five issues, so far, that have changed the immigration landscape in Trump's second term.
ALIEN ENEMIES ACT
Trump's use of an obscure 18th-century war powers act to expand and expedite deportations raises concerns about potential violations of the constitutional right to due process as outlined in the Fifth Amendment.
Why it matters:
Used only three times prior since it was enacted in 1798, the Alien Enemies Act allows a president to detain or deport citizens of enemy nations, but only in the case of a "declared war" or "invasion" of the United States.
On March 15, Trump invoked the act to target alleged members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua. He claims the gang, which the U.S. labeled a terrorist group, is "conducting irregular warfare against the territory of the United States." The directive authorizes the expedited removal of all Venezuelan citizens 14 and older who are deemed to be members of the organization and who are not U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents.
What happened:
Anticipating Trump's invocation of the act, the American Civil Liberties Union and Democracy Forward sued to temporarily stop the administration from deporting five Venezuelan men. Later the same day, U.S. District Judge James Boasberg in Washington, D.C., issued an order barring the government from using the act to deport anyone. He ordered officials to immediately turn around the three deportation planes already in the air.
The Trump administration did not.
Some 137 Venezuelans were deported under the Alien Enemies Act and locked up in El Salvador's notorious CECOT megaprison, where they remain. The administration says everyone deported under the act is a member of Tren de Aragua. Immigrant-rights advocates counter that some deportees on those flights had no criminal record or proven gang affiliation. Some were marked for deportation because of their tattoos and "other unreliable indicators," says Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants Rights Project.
In late March, a three-judge panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit upheld Boasberg's order and denied the White House's use of the wartime authority by a vote of 2 to 1. Judge Patricia Millett, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, cited a lack of opportunity for the alleged gang members to contest the cases. "The government's removal scheme denies Plaintiffs even a gossamer thread of due process," Millett wrote in a concurring statement. "No notice, no hearing, no opportunity — zero process — to show that they are not members of the gang, to contest their eligibility for removal under the law, or to invoke legal protections against being sent to a place where it appears likely they will be tortured and their lives endangered."
What's next:
The president's use of the act may be headed for a larger reckoning at the U.S. Supreme Court.
The high court in early April temporarily upheld the government's use of the act to deport alleged Tren de Aragua members, with an important caveat: They had to be provided with adequate notice and the opportunity to contest their detentions and deportations on a case-by-case basis.
On April 18, the ACLU filed an emergency appeal with the high court about a different set of migrants set for deportation, saying "dozens or hundreds of" detainees "are in imminent and ongoing jeopardy of being removed from the United States without notice and opportunity to be heard, in direct contravention of" the court's ruling two weeks earlier. The justices, in an unsigned order late at night, ruled that the government should not "remove any member of the putative class of detainees from the United States until further order of this Court."
Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas dissented, writing that the ruling granted "unprecedented and legally questionable relief without giving the lower courts a chance to rule."
MAHMOUD KHALIL
The detention of the 30-year-old, Syrian-born graduate student and pro-Palestinian activist, a green-card holder who was in the U.S. legally, has raised serious concerns about free speech rights and due process. The government is seeking to deport him for his pro-Palestinian activism on Columbia University's campus in 2024.
Why it matters:
Khalil was the first of several noncitizen international students and academics arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Khalil and his attorneys say the government is retaliating against him for speaking out in support of Palestinian rights and against Israel's ongoing war in Gaza. They're challenging his deportation in federal court, arguing it's an unconstitutional violation of his free speech and due process rights.
The Trump administration's attempt to deport Khalil has become symbolic of its broader crackdown against noncitizen students and pro-Palestinian campus protesters. The administration has revoked visas for hundreds of them. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters in March, "We're looking every day for these lunatics that are tearing things up," adding, "I think it's crazy to invite students into your country that are coming onto your campus and destabilizing it."
What happened:
Khalil, who is married to a U.S. citizen, was arrested on March 8 by ICE agents in the lobby of his university apartment building and was quickly sent to a detention center in rural Louisiana, where he is now fighting deportation. Trump took a hard line, calling Khalil's "the first arrest of many to come" and calling him "a Radical Foreign Pro-Hamas Student." Trump went on to accuse Khalil and other campus protesters of engaging "in pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity." But a senior official from the Department of Homeland Security struggled to defend the arrest on Morning Edition.
Rubio later characterized Khalil's activism as "antisemitic" and "disruptive." He stripped Khalil of his permanent residency and ordered him deported by using an obscure provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952.
This rarely used Cold War provision gives the secretary of state wide authority to determine that a noncitizen's presence in the U.S. threatens foreign policy goals. Rubio said Khalil's activism undermined the goal of combating antisemitism worldwide. The administration has not provided any evidence to support that claim.
What's next:
In early April, an immigration judge at the Louisiana facility where Khalil is being held ruled that he can be deported because she lacked the authority to question Rubio's decision, which he laid out in a two-page memo. She suggested that she could order Khalil deported to Algeria, where he is a citizen, or to his birth country, Syria. Khalil's lawyers are appealing.
His deportation is likely not imminent for another reason. The federal judge hearing Khalil's lawsuit challenging his detention has ordered the government not to remove him from the country while that case moves forward.
Khalil recently missed the birth of his first child after ICE denied his request to be briefly released under supervision so he could attend.
KILMAR ABREGO GARCIA
Concerns about adequate due process and what legal protections noncitizens are afforded are at the heart of the case of the 29-year-old Maryland man the White House concedes was mistakenly deported in March to a megaprison in El Salvador — despite a 2019 court order barring his removal.
Why it matters:
Abrego Garcia's case has catalyzed a growing clash between the White House and the courts.
This month, the Supreme Court sided with a district judge who'd ordered Abrego Garcia brought back to the United States. The high court ruled that the Trump administration should help "facilitate" Abrego Garcia's return.
The Trump administration has since doubled down and argued that Abrego Garcia should not be brought back because he is a gang member. The White House is banking on strong political support for deporting criminals, but a plurality of adults in the recent NPR/PBS News/Marist poll disapproved of the way the administration is handling the case, including a majority of independent voters.
A federal appeals court in Virginia pressed the administration to do more to release Abrego Garcia. In one remarkable opinion, Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III, a conservative Reagan appointee who sits on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit, said the government's argument "should be shocking not only to judges, but to the intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses still hold dear."
What happened:
Abrego Garcia was driving home from work as a construction laborer with his 5-year-old son in the car when ICE officers pulled him over. He was arrested. A few days later, Abrego Garcia was put on a flight alongside alleged Tren de Aragua gang members and deported.
Abrego Garcia does not have a criminal record. He originally entered the U.S. illegally, but an immigration judge ruled in 2019 that he could not be deported to El Salvador because his life would likely be endangered if he were to return.
What's next:
So far, the Justice Department has stonewalled U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, who ordered the Trump administration to explain what it has done, and plans to do, to "facilitate" Abrego Garcia's release from custody in El Salvador.
The White House continues to insist that Abrego Garcia is a member of MS-13, the Salvadoran gang that the Trump administration recently declared a foreign terrorist organization. Abrego Garcia's lawyers and family dispute that and say the allegation is based on extremely flimsy evidence yet to be proved in court.
"The government asserts that Abrego Garcia is a terrorist and a member of MS-13. Perhaps, but perhaps not," wrote Wilkinson. "Regardless, he is still entitled to due process."
BIRTHRIGHT CITIZENSHIP
As outlined in the 14th Amendment of the Constitution and upheld after the Civil War, birthright citizenship is automatically granted to people born on U.S. soil. Trump has sought to reinterpret that "blood right" by denying citizenship to people born to parents without legal status or temporarily in the United States.
Why it matters:
Trump signed an executive order on his first day in office to exclude from birthright citizenship the U.S.-born children of parents who are temporarily or illegally in the country. Most legal analysts called the move blatantly unconstitutional.
The 14th Amendment, which codified birthright citizenship in 1868, says: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."
Trump has repeatedly maintained that there is no automatic guarantee of birthright citizenship in the Constitution. That idea is widely considered a fringe legal view. The Supreme Court ruled to the contrary 127 years ago, and that decision has never been overturned.
What happened:
Attorneys general from 22 states, the ACLU and a group of pregnant mothers and immigration advocates have all sued the Trump administration to stop this executive order from taking effect.
U.S. district judges in three states ruled to block the order, rulings that the White House appealed, leading to three separate appeals courts uphold the blocks on enforcement of Trump's order.
Judge John Coughenour, a Reagan appointee in Washington state, was the first to block Trump's executive order, calling it "blatantly unconstitutional."
"I have difficulty understanding how a member of the bar could state unequivocally that this is a constitutional order," Coughenour told the Trump administration's attorney. "It boggles my mind."
What's next:
The U.S. Supreme Court will hear the case on May 15 and is likely to make a decision by early summer.
ASYLUM ACCESS
Trump's overhaul of the U.S. immigration system has caused border crossings to plummet during the first months of 2025. The near-total ban of asylum access outlined in an executive action signed on Jan. 20 has also raised concerns about asylum-seekers in the U.S. who are now being detained and deported without due process.
Why it matters:
The changes have sparked lawsuits, stirred confusion and concern among refugees and asylum-seekers, and brought into question the U.S. as a destination for those fleeing persecution worldwide. Asylum has been part of U.S. law since 1980, allowing people who fear for their safety to seek refuge in the country.
What happened:
In his first week, Trump signed executive orders that paused the U.S. refugee program and asylum applications through the southern U.S. border. The administration also moved to end temporary legal protections for people from specific countries.
Trump's moves on asylum and refugees, as well as his efforts to end temporary protected status and the humanitarian parole program known as CHNV, mean immigrants who came to the U.S. under these programs are now potentially vulnerable to detention and deportation after being initially allowed into the United States.
Those immigrants include Haitians fleeing gang warfare, Afghans left behind by the United States' hasty military pullout, Venezuelans escaping dictatorship and economic collapse, and Ukrainians from Russian-occupied areas.
The administration also froze funds for groups working with refugees to help them resettle in the U.S., amid a broader push to review federal funding for aid organizations and others. And the Trump administration directed judges within the Justice Department's system of immigration courts to fast-track certain asylum rejections without a hearing.
The moves have been challenged in courts, and migrants have sued over the administration's cancellation of asylum appointments through the CBP One mobile app.
Migrants seeking asylum previously used the app to schedule appointments in the U.S. through a legal authority known as humanitarian parole. The Trump administration has since relaunched the app as CBP Home and used it to encourage people to self-deport.
What's next:
The legal cases are still wending their way through lower and appellate courts. Some judges have paused or postponed the Trump administration's plans to end temporary protected status programs. Still, others have denied a request for a temporary restraining order from advocates for asylum-seekers, arguing that the judiciary lacks the authority to compel the U.S. government to parole noncitizens and that the president has the power to restrict entry to the United States.
NPR's immigration team includes reporters Jasmine Garsd, Adrian Florido, Joel Rose, Sergio Martínez-Beltrán and Ximena Bustillo, producer Liz Baker, and editors Eric Westervelt, Anna Yukhananov and Julia Redpath.
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