This interview with Dr. Kristina Lovato, director of the Center on Immigration and Child Welfare, explores how immigration enforcement and deportation-related family separation shape the well-being of immigrant children and families, and what practitioners, researchers, and legal professionals can do to better support them.
This research brief warns that since family detention centers reopened in March 2025, the number of detained families has more than tripled while a growing number of others have lost a parent to deportation, causing documented harm to children’s development, mental health, and education.
This brief presents survey data on the health and healthcare experiences of immigrant parents and their children in the US, highlighting the impact of the current immigration policy environment on families, the majority of whose children are US citizens.
This resource summarizes recent changes to healthcare, nutrition, and other public benefit programs by immigration status.
This policy brief summarizes how recent federal immigration policies threaten children’s well-being through family separation and detention, and outlines state and local strategies to protect children’s rights and support immigrant families.
The March 2026 Visa Bulletin opens a new window for many young people with Special Immigrant Juvenile Status to apply for a green card and work authorization, and this resource guides advocates through the adjustment of status filing process.
This resource offers safety planning guidance for academics and scholars working on immigration policy.
Immigrant mothers are increasingly having survival conversations with their children about ICE enforcement, drawing parallels to the “Talk” Black families have long given their children about police.
Families released from the Dilley detention facility face an abrupt and disorienting transition and grapple with the lasting medical, psychological, and financial consequences of detention.
After eight months in immigration detention, a 25-year-old former foster youth and advocate chose to voluntarily leave the US for Mexico, separating him from his 4-year-old son and the only country he has known since age 3.
© 2026 CICW.