What impact did DHS parole policies and border enforcement changes in 2024–2025 have on estimates of the unauthorized population?
Executive summary
Changes to DHS parole programs and tougher border enforcement in 2024–2025 materially altered the flows counted in administrative data and likely slowed — and by mid‑2025 probably reversed — the upward trajectory of the U.S. unauthorized immigrant population, though the population almost surely remained above its July 2023 peak of about 14 million and important data gaps prevent precise accounting [1] [2].
1. Parole programs had been a major short‑term driver of population growth — then they were paused and terminated
Large, supporter‑based parole programs such as CHNV (Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, Venezuelans), Uniting for Ukraine (U4U), and family reunification parole together admitted hundreds of thousands of people between 2022 and late 2024 — DHS counted roughly 774,000 parole grants across those classes through September 2024 and other DHS tabulations show more than half a million CHNV admissions through December 2024 — and from July 2023 through June 2024 more than 2.1 million migrants were either released or paroled into the United States, a major component of the measured unauthorized population increase [3] [4] [1] [2].
2. Suspensions and executive action sharply reduced those inflows starting July 2024 and again in early 2025
DHS and USCIS briefly suspended some parole processes in summer 2024 amid fraud and vetting concerns, paused new CHNV admissions in August 2024, and following an executive order in January 2025 the administration moved to suspend and ultimately terminate categorical parole processes such as CHNV and pause family‑reunification pathways — actions documented by GAO and DHS statements and culminating in formal termination of CHNV in March 2025 [5] [3] [1].
3. Border enforcement changes produced a visible decline in encounters and releases captured in administrative data
Administrative counts of southwest border encounters fell markedly after these policy shifts: DHS reported about 2.1 million southwest border encounters in FY2024 and around 444,000 in FY2025, reflecting both fewer releases/paroles and expanded use of expedited removal or other enforcement tools that reduce the number of people released into the country and therefore included in unauthorized‑population estimates [5] [1].
4. Analysts infer a slowdown and likely decline in the unauthorized population, but uncertainty remains
Pew Research and other analysts conclude that growth slowed considerably in the last half of 2024 after parole pauses and asylum restrictions and that the unauthorized population probably began to decline in 2025, yet they emphasize that surveys and federal data are incomplete and that more complete 2025 data are needed to quantify the net change precisely [2] [1].
5. Policy changes also shifted who is counted and who faces removal, complicating estimates
Beyond fewer paroles, DHS directives expanding expedited removal authority and moves to revoke parole and employment authorization for some beneficiaries mean that some individuals who would previously have been counted as present in the U.S. unauthorized population could be removed or re‑classified, producing downward pressure on population estimates that is as much a measurement and enforcement effect as a change in underlying migration demand [6] [7] [3].
6. Competing narratives and political framing matter for interpretation
Republican officials and DHS statements characterize the prior parole programs as an “abuse” that admitted large numbers (one DHS statement claimed 1.5 million), while oversight reports and GAO highlight fraud risks and vetting shortfalls as justification for suspension; analysts such as Pew and migration research centers focus on the empirical count effects and stress data limitations, so readers must weigh political claims against audits and the raw administrative counts [6] [8] [5] [1].
7. Bottom line: a substantial short‑term impact, but full effects still unresolved
In sum, the combination of pausing and terminating major parole classes, tightened vetting and fees, and expanded enforcement produced a marked reduction in admissions and border encounters that plausibly pushed the unauthorized population from growth into decline by mid‑2025, yet the population almost certainly remained higher than in July 2023 and a full, precise accounting awaits more complete data and follow‑up research [1] [2] [5].