President Donald Trump and his administration pledged to tackle the nation’s immigration crisis, which skyrocketed under former President Joe Biden. Here are some of the latest updates.

Illegal Immigrants Surge Swing States

Amid worries that illegal immigrants may be voting in U.S. elections, President Trump recently ordered a new census be taken, counting only American citizens. While the move is considered controversial by some, new data is suggesting that illegal immigrants have been strategically relocated to impact elections. A Pew Research Center survey published on Thursday discovered that, during his first two years in the White House, Biden funneled over one million illegal immigrants into battleground states and 450,000 into Texas, which has, in recent weeks, become the center of a national showdown over redistricting.

Between 2021 and the end of 2023, illegal immigrants surged into nine states typically considered swing states: Arizona (+50,000), Florida (+700,000), Georgia (+100,000), Michigan (+80,000), Nevada (+30,000), North Carolina (+100,000), Ohio (+70,000), Pennsylvania (+80,000), and Wisconsin (+30,000). Additionally, Texas saw an illegal immigrant increase of 450,000, California of 425,000, and New York of 230,000.

In its study, Pew refers to illegal immigrants as “unauthorized immigrants,” which the polling firm says includes immigrants who entered the U.S. legally but overstayed visas and immigrants who entered the country illegally but were given temporary protected status (TPS) or were paroled into the nation by Biden. In multiple instances, the Biden administration used government funding to relocate tens of thousands of TPS immigrants to states far from the border, like Ohio and Pennsylvania, wreaking havoc on local communities.

According to Pew, the illegal immigrant population nationwide increased from 10.5 million in 2021 to 14 million by the end of 2023. However, organizations such as the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) estimate the number of illegal immigrants in the U.S. to be upwards of 18 million. Pew also noted that a “record” of 7.5 million U.S. households included illegal immigrants, out of 133 million households across the country. Nearly 70% of those households are “mixed status,” Pew said, often with a child having been born in the U.S. and thus obtaining “birthright citizenship,” despite the illegal immigration status of the child’s parents. On his first day back in the Oval Office, Trump signed an executive order ending “birthright citizenship,” although federal courts have since impeded his efforts.

Federal Judge Blocks Trump Travel Ban

Another federal court has also tried to curtail the president’s immigration agenda recently. Foreign-born Judge Sparkle Sooknanan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia determined on Thursday that a travel ban imposed on a host of foreign nations by the U.S. State Department was at least partially unlawful. In June, the State Department issued a travel ban against Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, citing national security, terrorism, and crime threats, and against Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela, citing high visa overstay rates and the lack of centralized governments in those nations.

Sooknanan argued that the travel ban prevented a handful of individuals in those countries from receiving visas under the Diversity Visa Program, which annually awards 55,000 U.S. visas and a pathway to legal permanent residency via a lottery system, with the intention of “diversifying” the immigrant population in the U.S. According to Sooknanan, several individuals from nations on the travel ban list were chosen to receive diversity visas, which the State Department later refused to issue, citing the travel ban.

In a statement to The Daily Signal, State Department spokesman Tommy Piggot called Sooknanan’s decision “[a]nother example of wrongful judicial overreach aimed at curtailing this Administration’s strong and unwavering efforts to keep Americans and our communities safe.” He added, “We will continue to relentlessly work to ensure the president of the United States is able to use every tool he has available, including visas, to finally bring oversight to who we allow to visit our country.”

Court Halts ‘Alligator Alcatraz’

In June, the Trump administration teamed up with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) and Attorney General James Uthmeier (R) to open a detention center to house arrested illegal immigrants prior to deportation. Dubbed “Alligator Alcatraz” due to its location in the Everglades and the dangerous wildlife surrounding the area, the detention center has faced legal challenges. Most recently, a federal judge blocked a planned expansion, citing ecological concerns.

On Thursday, Judge Kathleen Williams of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida issued a preliminary injunction halting further construction on “Alligator Alcatraz” after several environmentalist organizations and the Miccosukee Tribe filed complaints, claiming that further expansion and operations would violate environmental laws. She also ordered officials to remove fencing, lighting, and power generators from the facility. DeSantis pledged to appeal the decision.