Developments in 2024 will reverberate in 2025 to drive U.S. immigration policy. That will make some events predictable, such as Donald Trump’s pursuit of mass deportation of undocumented immigrants. However, other developments in 2024 may foreshadow unexpected outcomes on immigration in 2025.
Trump’s Election And His Campaign Rhetoric On Immigration
Donald Trump regaining the White House will affect future immigration policies more than any other event in 2024. However, the way he won mattered. Trump used extreme rhetoric to characterize immigrants and individuals with Temporary Protected Status. He accused Haitians of eating their neighbors’ pets and said migrants were “attacking villages” and taking over towns. He claimed many migrants were released from foreign prisons and insane asylums to commit crimes in America. In December 2024, Trump blamed the truck attack in New Orleans that killed 14 people on “criminals coming in” from other nations, even though the assailant was a 42-year-old U.S.-born Army veteran. Journalists who fact-checked Trump disputed those characterizations.
Trump’s rhetoric will lead to at least four substantive policies in 2025. First, an effort at mass deportation of people in the U.S. in unlawful status. Second, the Laken Riley Act becoming law. The legislation mandates the detention of undocumented immigrants arrested for theft and enacts other changes, including measures that could further restrict legal immigration. Third, Trump said during the campaign he wanted to end Temporary Protected Status for Haitians and, by implication, TPS holders from other nations. In January 2024, the Biden administration extended TPS for Venezuelans, Salvadorans, Ukrainians and Sudanese. Fourth, by escalating the threat created by illegal immigration, Trump has encouraged the use of any means available to drive down unlawful entry across the Southwest border without regard to the consequences.
Republicans Win Narrow Majorities In The House And Senate That Will Affect Immigration Policy And Spending
Republicans retained the House and won the Senate. However, the margins are narrow in both chambers. That could complicate efforts at enacting restrictive immigration policies, including approval for spending to fund a border wall, increased detention and more agents for mass deportation. Republicans hope to accomplish that spending through reconciliation, which can avoid a Democratic filibuster in the Senate. The tumultuous process the public witnessed in December 2024 to prevent a government shutdown indicates that at least some House Republicans will balk at new spending not accompanied by significant offsets.
Republican victories have encouraged more Democrats to seek accommodation with GOP lawmakers on immigration issues. Several House and Senate Democrats supported the passage of the Laken Riley Act despite the bill’s controversial measures. The bill could allow a state Attorney General to sue to block visas for a country that does not take back a deportee, usurping the power of the executive branch and potentially preventing hundreds of thousands of workers, students or visitors from entering the United States, including from India and China.
The Silicon Valley Allies Who Helped Trump Win Support High-Skilled Immigration
Donald Trump’s victory in 2024 differed from 2016 in at least one significant way: In 2024, he had unprecedented support from venture capital firms, technology executives and Elon Musk. CBS News reported that Musk spent $277 million to support Trump and other Republicans in 2025. Musk has already engaged in a public dispute on H-1B visas with anti-immigrant political activist Laura Loomer, who attacked an Indian immigrant political appointee.
Tesla, headed by Musk, emerged in 2024 as number 16 among companies with the most approved H-1B petitions for initial employment after never breaking the top 25 in previous years. In FY 2024, Tesla had 742 approved H-1B petitions for initial employment, more than double the 328 in FY 2023 and 337 in FY 2022, according to a National Foundation for American Policy analysis.
In June 2024, Trump taped a podcast interview on the show All-In with venture capitalists who had hosted him for a fundraising event. The venture capitalists expressed support for high-skilled immigration, which elicited a response from then-candidate Trump. “What I want to do and what I will do is you graduate from a college, I think you should get automatically as part of your diploma a green card to be able to stay in this country,” said Trump. “And that includes junior colleges too, anybody graduates from a college. You go there for two years or four years.” Trump promised to address the issue on “day one.”
Trump acting on this promise appears unlikely. However, the support for more high-skilled immigration by Musk and others conflicts with the restrictive policies the Trump administration pursued in the first term. Trump officials, including White House Senior Adviser Stephen Miller, tried to make it impossible for many foreign-born scientists and engineers to qualify for H-1B status. It also issued a rule, later blocked, that attempted to price H-1B visa holders and employment-based immigrants out of the U.S. labor market.
The Rise And Likely Fall Of U.S. Refugee Admissions And Its Impact On Immigration Levels
In FY 2024, 100,034 refugees arrived in the United States, according to the U.S. Refugee Processing Center. That compares to only 30,000 arrivals in FY 2019 and 11,814 in FY 2020 under Trump. Stephen Miller worked against admitting refugees in Trump’s first term, and he returns to the White House in 2025 with a more powerful title. The Biden administration set a refugee ceiling of 125,000 for FY 2025. Religious and human rights groups are bracing for Miller to ignore that ceiling, suspend refugee admissions and drive refugee arrivals to FY 2019 and FY 2020 levels or lower. Reducing refugee admissions will lower overall legal immigration levels.
Low Border Numbers And Mexican Cooperation On Immigration
Donald Trump campaigned and continues to speak as if the border remains in “crisis.” The data point to a different reality: Illegal entry is lower today than when Donald Trump left office. In December 2024, there were 47,326 Border Patrol encounters at the Southwest border, 37% below the level of 75,316 encounters in January 2021 when Trump was president. The Biden administration’s use of legal pathways, a June 2024 executive order on asylum policy and close cooperation with Mexico contributed to the significant decline at the border since July 2024.
Trump faces a dilemma: He cannot say Americans elected him to address a problem that is already largely solved. It would interfere with convincing members of Congress to pass high levels of spending on immigration enforcement and legal attempts to declare a national emergency. That means he will likely ignore the data, continue his rhetoric and, among other actions, criticize Mexico until he announces an agreement with the Mexican government. It’s possible after the Trump administration implements his policies, including eliminating legal pathways, illegal entry will be higher in Trump’s second term than when Joe Biden left office.
Immigration Lawsuits And The End Of Chevron Deference
In June 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Loper Bright Enterprises et al. v. Raimondo: “The Administrative Procedure Act requires courts to exercise their independent judgment in deciding whether an agency has acted within its statutory authority, and courts may not defer to an agency interpretation of the law simply because a statute is ambiguous; Chevron is overruled.”
The end of Chevron deference to federal agencies may help businesses, universities and public interest groups in immigration lawsuits during a second Trump administration should officials enact policies like those in the first term. That could cut across several issues, including asylum, public charge, H-1B visas and international student policy, and lead to unexpected outcomes.
