The Public Is Losing Patience With Trump on Immigration. Your Move, Congress.
Donald Trump won the presidency in part on promises to deport immigrants who have criminal records and lack permanent legal status. But his earliest executive orders—trying to undo birthright citizenship, suspending critical refugee programs—made clear he wants to attack immigrants with permanent legal status too. In our series Who Gets to Be American This Week? , we'll track the Trump administration's attempts to exclude an ever-growing number of people from the American experiment.
We've been hearing for years about America's broken immigration system while also watching Congress fail to pass legislation to address it.
Last year, polling found that immigration was the top issue voters were concerned about heading into the 2024 election. Part of that was surely driven by the right demonizing immigrants and using them as a scapegoat for the country's problems. At the same time, years of inaction from Congress to fix a dysfunctional system compounded by the fact that there are very limited legal avenues for immigrating to this country contributed to creating an untenable situation at the border—and bred resentment among immigrants who've been in the country for decades toward more recent arrivals.
All of that helped propel Trump into office again on a promise to carry out mass deportations. But six months into his second term, his chaotic and lawless methods are proving unpopular — and recent polling is showing high levels of support for expanding legal immigration . Against this backdrop, a coalition of Democratic and Republican members of Congress is reintroducing a comprehensive immigration bill that would create a legal pathway to residency for the 13.7 million people living and working in the US with varying legal statuses.
Here's the immigration news we're keeping an eye on this week:
Last week, a group of 20 Democratic and Republican legislators reintroduced the Dignity Act, a bill that was first released in 2023. After making revisions that narrow eligibility for US citizenship and eliminating overlap from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that passed earlier this month, the latest version of the Dignity Act attempts to find a solution to immigration issues that have been lingering for the better part of the past three decades.
“The Dignity Act of 2025 is a revolutionary bill that offers the solution to our immigration crisis: secure the border, stop illegal immigration, and provide an earned opportunity for long-term immigrants to stay here and work,” said Republican Rep. María Salazar in a statement . “No amnesty. No handouts. No citizenship. Just accountability and a path to stability for our economy and our future.”
Salazar's bill would establish the Dignity Program, a temporary pathway to legal status. Only people who have been in the US without legal status since before 2021 would be eligible to apply, after passing a criminal background check and submitting a $1,000 fee. If selected, these immigrants would be considered in “Dignity Status,” allowing them to legally work and live in the US for up to seven years, with protection from deportation. They would not be eligible for any federal benefits or entitlement programs like Medicaid or food stamps. To maintain this status, they must continue paying $1,000 every year. Once their seven years are up, individuals would be allowed to reapply to the Dignity Program.
These benefits are similar to what a green card offers, but without the pathway to US citizenship or the ability to sponsor family members to immigrate to the US It's far from a perfect solution, but it does make a substantial attempt to create desperately needed stability for millions of immigrants who've been living in the US largely in the shadows. The steep fees of the Dignity Program will undoubtedly push it out of reach for many immigrants, but Jorge Loweree, managing director of programs and strategy at American Immigration Council, told me that was intentional on the part of legislators to ensure it was not considered amnesty: “These are strict requirements that not everyone will be able to achieve and represent a real sacrifice on the part of many, perhaps most of the people, who would seek to avail themselves of this program.”
The Dignity Act also creates a pathway to citizenship for Dreamers, people who were brought to the US as children—the group that the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was designed for. It also includes a mandate for Homeland Security to build “humanitarian campuses” at the border where social workers, case managers, and legal support would be offered to asylum-seekers.
Public opinion on immigration is shifting, with a recent Gallup poll of about 1,400 US adults finding that 78 percent of Americans approve of allowing immigrants without legal status a chance to become US citizens, which could increase the chances of Congress actually passing a bill that expands legal immigration. Loweree is cautiously optimistic about it. “The stars will have to align for immigration reform to finally happen in the US But I think we're seeing things trending in a direction where there may be space and possibility for meaningful negotiations to take place,” he said. The White House has mostly brushed off such polling , insisting Americans are happy that Donald Trump is keeping his mass deportation promise and that his immigration agenda has bipartisan support.
At the same time, some bills to further limit immigration may be heading back to Congress. Republican Rep. Jim Jordan is reportedly thinking of reviving his hard-line bill that passed the House last year. Rep. Chip Roy also recently introduced two immigration bills, one aimed at completely ending temporary protected status and another eliminating the executive branch's authority to shield immigrants from deportations by invoking national security powers.
Such bills would face a steep hurdle in the Senate, where they could be filibustered.
In a typical administration, there are about 700 immigration judges posted throughout the country, each fulfilling a critical job: deciding whether someone should be allowed to remain in the country and approving or rejecting asylum applications and other immigration case decisions. Since Trump assumed the presidency earlier this year, his administration has fired a slew of these judges, even as 3.5 million cases remain pending in immigration court.
Three immigration judges in Chicago were recently fired without cause, including Assistant Chief Immigration Judge Jennifer Peyton. She explained to local TV station WTTW that she was first appointed to an immigration judgeship back in 2016 by the Obama administration, but was kept on during Trump's first term. However, since Trump assumed office again, there's been a drastic shift. “Four of our senior leadership in the Executive Office for Immigration Review were fired within hours of inauguration,” Peyton said.
Carla Espinoza is another Chicago immigration judge who was recently fired, finding out while she was on the bench about to announce a decision. She told WTTW that ideally, immigration judges should resolve about 700 cases a year. “My first fiscal year, I adjudicated over 1,000 cases. I was praised by government attorneys, the private bar. I had (positive) reviews from my chief judge … so it was not a performance issue.”
Homero López, legal director of Immigration Services and Legal Advocacy, was chosen as an appellate immigration judge under the Biden administration. He was fired by the Trump administration while still serving his probationary period back in February. “It's pretty clear that the administration is trying to set up a system where the immigration judges will implement the administration's policy of mass deportation,” López told me, “instead of giving people a fair shot at due process.”
According to the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, the union representing immigration judges, some 50 immigration judges have been terminated so far. Yet at the same time, Congress passed the One Big Beautiful Bill, which awarded Homeland Security $3.3 billion for immigration case prosecutions and to hire new immigration judges.
Immigration judges are considered federal employees, as they are not part of the judiciary, but the executive branch. People can apply to an immigration judgeship and after a probationary period, the attorney general goes on to appoint them—but it's not a lifetime appointment. While this makes immigration judges fireable under certain circumstances, just like any other federal employee, there is typically not much turnover among immigration judges even if the White House flips parties.
López believes all of these firings are likely going to make current and future immigration judges second-guess their opinions on cases, particularly ones where they are inclined to rule in favor of the immigrant. “It's this way of weaponizing the system, because it's not an independent body,” López said. “Instead, it's a system that the president and his administration can mold into what they want their policy to look like.”
The Trump administration's mass deportation agenda has seen an influx of people to detention facilities, particularly in Florida, where, since January, there's been a 46 percent increase in the number of detainees. Human Rights Watch found that this is creating a deadly situation for immigrants. The global advocacy group, alongside Americans for Immigrant Justice and Sanctuary of the South, published a report detailing findings that three Florida detention centers are denying people medical care and food, and placing them in dirty cells. At least three people have died in federal immigration custody there this year.
Florida's three detention centers include Krome North Service Processing Center, Broward Transitional Center, and Federal Detention Center. In Krome, Human Rights Watch found that detainees were being routinely held in freezing cells that were over capacity while being denied bedding and access to basic hygiene. One man told the advocacy groups that he was forced to sleep next to a toilet in a room so crowded that people had to step over each other to move. “Another said he was denied access to soap or water for 20 consecutive days,” Human Rights Watch said . “At Krome after processing, some cells held more than double their intended capacity.”
Detainees at all three facilities alleged that they were denied medical care for chronic conditions including diabetes, asthma, and HIV. Many of these people were taken to a hospital only after experiencing a medical emergency, including Harpinder Chauhan , a British entrepreneur detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Despite having both diabetes and heart disease, Chauhan said he was denied insulin at various points during his detention at Krome, FDC, and BTC. At one point he collapsed, and only then was he taken to a hospital.
In April, the report said, a Haitian woman detained at BTC died after she received delayed emergency medical care. A Ukrainian detainee died at Krome after being denied treatment for high blood pressure. His wife told Human Rights Watch that he experienced heart palpitations, but immigration officers still denied him immediate medical care. He was eventually taken to a hospital, where he later died.
The report, which goes on to describe at length many more instances of abuse by immigration detention officers, is the result of interviews with 11 immigrants who were held across Florida's three detention facilities, along with family members of seven detainees. Federal immigration documents and ICE data were also analyzed.
Human Rights Watch says these conditions not only violate international law but also US government detention standards. “People in immigration detention are being treated as less than human,” Belkis Wille, associate crisis and conflict director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement. “These are not isolated incidents, but rather the result of a fundamentally broken detention system that is rife with serious abuses.”
Meanwhile, Florida has established yet another detention center that's already facing allegations of inhumane conditions. Those being held at the new state-run facility, which Trump has dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz,” have described cage-like cells full of mosquitoes . Detainees have also reported a lack of food and medical care.
Florida is far from the first state to face such allegations. In a damning report published last year, Louisiana's detention facilities were accused of denying people translation services, food, drinking water, and medical care, while also physically abusing detainees, including through sexual and verbal abuse, solitary confinement, and retaliation.
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