This Week in Immigration

In the 200th and final episode of "This Week in Immigration," host Jack Malde and BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown reflect on the Bipartisan Policy Center's decade-long involvement in immigration reform. Joined by Henry Cisneros, former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, they discuss the achievements and challenges faced by the BPC's Immigration Task Force. The episode delves int...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown sits down with Wendy Edelberg of the Brookings Institution and Stan Veuger of the American Enterprise Institute to discuss their recent report, Immigration Policy and Its Macroeconomic Effects in the Second Trump Administration. We explore how immigration policy choices, specifically enforcement and legal immigration restrictions, c...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown sits down with Amanda Bergson- Shilcock , senior fellow at the National Skills Coalition , to discuss the importance of our workforce development system, the urgent need to address skills gaps and the role that immigrants can play in meeting them. It's a workforce-centric episode on This Week in Immigration .      National Skills Co...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown sits down with Morris Levy, associate professor of Political Science and International Relations at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, to explore a recent study he co-authored , Integration Policy Specifics and Public Support for Increasing Immigration . The study presents results from three survey experiments a...

This week, we're re-releasing an episode from May 2024 featuring an interview with Alexander Kustov on his forthcoming book, In Our Interest: How to Make Immigration Popular. The book was recently published on April 29, 2025, making now an opportune time to revisit the conversation. In the episode, Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown and Associate Director Jack Malde speak with Kustov, Assistant...

In this week's episode of This Week in Immigration , BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown discusses the implications of a recent executive order that has sought to limit birthright citizenship in the United States. Immigration attorney and MacArthur Fellow Margaret Stock explains what current law says about who qualifies for U.S. citizenship, drawing on her years of experience helping U.S. ci...

In this week's episode of This Week in Immigration , BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown discusses the Trump administration's actions to rescind foreign students' status in the U.S. with two experts. Steve Springer from NAFSA explains the roles of educational institutions, students, and the government in maintaining student status and the implications of recent changes on international educa...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown interviews Associate Director Jack Malde about BPC's new report Bridging the Gap: Meeting Workforce Needs Over the Next Decade . The report uses a data-driven approach to identify the occupations and industries at the highest risk of workforce shortages over the next decade , with healthcare leading the list . Then, Jack interviews...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown sits down with Angelo Paparelli , a long-time immigration law expert, and Jeremy Neufeld from the Institute for Progress to discuss the H-1B visa lottery system. They explore the history of the lottery, recent policy changes, and ongoing reform debates, including Jeremy's proposal for a compensation-based model that prioritizes high...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown sits down with Robert Warren from the Center for Migration Studies, Jeffrey Passel from the Pew Research Center, and Jennifer Van Hook from the Migration Policy Institute to discuss methodologies used to estimate the unauthorized immigrant population, the recent trends in those estimates, and how they are used and understood (or mis...

In this week's episode, Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown sits down with Dr. Adam Ozimek , Chief Economist at the Economic Innovation Group, and Connor O'Brien , Research and Policy Analyst at EIG, to explore their latest report, Exceptional by Design: How to Fix High-Skilled Immigration to Maximize American Interests. They discuss the economic benefits of high-skilled immigration, challenge c...

In this week's episode, Associate Director Jack Malde talks to Executive Vice President of Human Capital , Cheryl Oldham , about BPC's recently launched Commission on the American Workforce – a bold initiative to develop a national, bipartisan strategy to strengthen the workforce, expand economic opportunity, and ensure the United States remains competitive. Jack and Senior Advisor Theresa Cardina...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown talks to Jon Baselice from the US Chamber of Commerce and Debu Gandhi from the Centre for American Progress about the outlook for immigration policy u nder a new Congress and presidency. They cover what we have learned so far and what we can expect under a GOP-trifecta.  

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown and Associate Director Jack Malde round up some recent news in US immigration policy from the end of 2024 and the first weeks of 2025 . They discuss recent disagreements within the Republican party on H-1B visas, President-elect Trump's immigration position nominations , and where things stand on the concept of "mass deportations ....

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown talks to three reporters about the role that immigration played in the recent presidential and congressional elections. There sa is joined by Myah Ward from Politico, Priscilla Alvarez from CNN, and Marianne LeVine from the Washington Post. They discuss how immigration featured in various campaigns, how pivotal immigration was in de...

In this week's episode, we're re-releasing a conversation from May 2022. The leak of the Supreme Court draft decision that would overturn the seminal Roe v. Wade abortion case has sent shockwaves through the country and raises questions and implications for other long-standing precedent Supreme Court decisions, including Plyler v. Doe, a 1982 decision that ruled that undocumented immigrant childre...

In this week's episode, we're re-releasing a conversation from November 2021. Every year millions of families across the country gather to celebrate that quintessential American holiday: Thanksgiving. It is a story of immigration. But how do the millions of recently-arrived immigrants to this country view this holiday? Theresa Cardinal Brown and Sadikshya Nepal are joined by Rachel Peric , Executi...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown delves into history and reality of how immigrants vote in the United States . Theresa is joined by Rachel Orey , Director of the Bipartisan Policy Center Elections Project , to discuss current legislation that defines the eligibility for voting and protect s against non-citizen voting . Then , Theresa welcomes Irene Bloemraad , Prof...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown discusses how immigrant rights organizations and other emergency response organizations are assisting immigrants and their families affected by recent hurricanes Helene and Milton, as well as similar past natural disasters in the United States. Theresa is joined by Zach Wolgemuth , Director of Emergency Preparedness, Response, and R...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown covers how DHS and USCIS are incorporating AI into their immigration work.  Theresa is joined by Paromita Shah , Co-Founder and Executive Director of Just Futures Law, who organized a letter signed by over 140 immigrant and civil rights groups to DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas urging him to end the use of AI . Theresa and Jack Mal...

In this week's episode , we focus on the increasingly salient issue of climate migration , delving into Climate Migration Council "A Compendium on Climate Mobility ". BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown talks to Shana Tabak , the Director of Immigration at Emerson Collective and a Senior Advisor to the Climate Migration Council, and Elizabeth Ferris , Director of the Institute for the Study...

In this week's episode, we 're re-releasing a conversation from September 2021. BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown reflects on how the 9/11 terrorist attacks reshaped our immigration system, and what it looked like before that pivotal day.  

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown talks to Michelle Hackman , a US immigration reporter at the Wall Street Journa l, about a recent decline in border crossings and to what extent we can credit the Biden Administration and its cooperation with Mexico. Then, Theresa and BPC Associate Director Jack Malde discuss the Biden Administration's "Keeping Families Together" pr...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown delves into new U.S. Immigration data findings, covered in recent reports by the Pew Research Center and Congressional Budget Office. First , Mark Hugo Lopez , the director of race and ethnicity research at the Pew Research Center, join s us to discuss new estimates and demographics of the foreign-born in the United States. Then, BP...

In this week's episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown delve s into a recent Biden a dministration executive order that helps Dreamers get a work visa , with Dan Berger , a noted immigration lawyer, writer and speaker, and fellow at Cornell Law School . The pair discuss es what new guidance on D-3 waiver s means for DACA recipients and internat i onal students . Then, given President Bi...