This review examines how the complex U.S. immigration system affects immigrant families’ access to opportunity, health, education, and safety. It urges scholars to study impacts from the migration journey through settlement while centering ethics in research with families made vulnerable by immigration laws.
This bulletin brief explains how the Trump administration is limiting non-citizens’ access to the immigration courts, especially by arresting them outside of courtrooms.
This brief examines how public charge and other immigration policies may discourage immigrants from enrolling in Medicaid and CHIP.
This guide helps practitioners understand and navigate the complicated and changing rules around public benefits eligibility for immigrants.
This guide provides important steps for parents at risk of detention or deportation to consider to ensure their child’s well-being.
These state-specific guides help immigrant families create safety plans for their children in case of detention or deportation, providing information on custody options, legal forms, vital records, and consulate contacts.
This 2025 “year-in-review” highlights the CICW’s work throughout 2025. Thank you to all our partners and collaborators for your continued support. We look forward to continuing our efforts to support immigrant children and families in 2026.
CWLA is offering a three-part virtual training series based on the third edition of “Working with Traumatized Children – A Handbook for Healing,” which will teach participants how to recognize trauma symptoms, understand trauma’s impact on children’s brains, create safe environments, and implement effective healing strategies while practicing self-care.
This webinar will analyze Trump’s first-year immigration actions, including mass deportations, refugee restrictions, and travel bans on 39 countries, examining their legal basis and actual effects on labor markets, communities, and future immigration to the United States.
ICE has placed more immigrant children in federal shelters this year than the previous four years combined, with kids now spending an average of six months in custody under Trump compared to one month under Biden.
The Trump administration has transferred dozens of unaccompanied migrant children from inside the U.S. to four detention facilities in South Texas where they are being held while awaiting deportation.
Hundreds of immigrant children have been held in federal detention beyond legal time limits, with some detained for over five months, raising alarms among legal advocates about the government’s failure to protect these children.
Trump’s current immigration enforcement is separating families differently than in his first-term – officials are detaining tens of thousands of migrants and asylum-seekers inside the U.S., holding a record 66,000 people in often poor conditions while deporting others and dividing families of mixed legal status.
Federal immigration raids across southeast Louisiana and other cities have resulted in over 250 arrests this month, leaving some teenagers to suddenly take on adult responsibilities as breadwinners and caretakers after their parents were detained.
A federal court blocked ICE’s new policy of automatically transferring unaccompanied migrant children into adult detention facilities when they turn 18, reinforcing protections that keep immigrant teens out of adult centers.
Since Trump took office, at least 3,800 children including 20 infants have been detained by ICE due to the administration’s renewed family detention policy, according to an analysis of government data.
Federal border officials are pressuring unaccompanied migrant children into agreeing to return to their countries of origin despite safety concerns about returning home.
Federal workers at the agency handling unaccompanied minors who crossed the border report being instructed to stop releasing these children to their U.S.-based family members.
The House has passed a bill that would require the Department of Health and Human Services to consider additional information when deciding where to place unaccompanied migrant children in its custody.
This article, which quotes CICW Director, Kristina Lovato, and her research with unaccompanied minors, describes the multitude of challenges immigrant youth face as they navigate living amidst the Trump administration’s deportation agenda.
© 2026 CICW.