Biden at the Two-Year Mark: Significant Immigration Actions Eclipsed by Record Border Numbers

Two years into his term, President Joe Biden has relied on executive action to advance his immigration agenda more than his predecessors. The Migration Policy Institute (MPI) estimates the Biden administration has taken 403 immigration-related executive actions so far, putting it on pace to far surpass the 472 made throughout the four years of the Trump administration—which was perceived as the most activist yet on immigration.

These actions have touched virtually every aspect of the sprawling U.S. immigration system and affected the lives of hundreds of thousands of immigrants, Senior Fellow Muzaffar Chishti and Associate Policy Analyst Kathleen Bush-Joseph write in the new U.S. Policy Beat article.

Yet the executive actions have come notably short of the full, top-to-bottom reform that Biden promised upon entering office. And for much of the public, the changes have been overshadowed by the record number of arrivals at the U.S.-Mexico border, which is arguably Biden's single most frustrating immigration challenge.

Top Takeaways from Biden's First Two Years

1. Biden outpacing Trump: With 403 immigration-related immigration executive actions so far, the Biden administration is on pace to nearly double the output from the Trump administration, if current trends hold.
2. Refugee numbers are down, but new pathways are on the rise: Despite falling far short of its goal of resettling 125,000 refugees last year, the Biden administration has admitted hundreds of thousands of migrants on humanitarian parole. Supporters applaud the moves to quickly welcome vulnerable individuals, including large numbers of Afghans and Ukrainians, but the effort has also swelled the population of immigrants with impermanent status.
3. Title 42 on the decline: Despite the attention it receives in the media and from immigrant-rights activists, authorities rely on Title 42 expulsions less than half the time when encountering irregularly arriving migrants at the border.
4. Sharp drop in deportations: Last year, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) carried out 72,100 removals, a fraction of the average 233,000 annual removals during the Trump administration and the 344,000 each year during the second term of the Obama administration. The quiet transformation comes even as new guidelines for targeted immigration enforcement in the U.S. interior have been paused by the courts.
5. Border tumult looms over everything: The well-documented, record-breaking number of arrivals at the U.S.-Mexico border threatens to overshadow much of what the Biden administration has done elsewhere. Especially now facing a Republican majority in the U.S. House of Representatives, much of the administration's legacy will depend on its ability to resolve the crush at the border.

Did You Know?

Chinese immigrants are the third largest national-origin group in the United States, but the population shrank amid the COVID-19 pandemic. China is the main source of foreign students enrolled in U.S. higher education and the United States is the top destination for Chinese immigrants worldwide.

This Lunar New Year, our Spotlight article provides a wealth of data about this immigrant group, including its size, geographic distribution, and socioeconomic characteristics.

New from MPI

The Skills and Economic Outcomes of Immigrant and U.S.-Born College Graduates
By Jeanne Batalova and Michael Fix

Four Strategies to Improve Community Services for Unaccompanied Children in the United States
By Jonathan Beier, Lauren Farwell, Rhonda Fleischer, and Essey Workie

A Profile of Low-Income Immigrants in the United States
By Julia Gelatt, Valerie Lacarte, and Joshua Rodriguez

Apprenticeship Programs Are a Promising Solution to Bring More Multilingual Workers into Early Childhood Field
By Jacob Hofstetter, Alexis Fintland, and Maki Park

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