ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION IN THE US: EXPLORING STATISTICS, DEBATES, AND YOUR OWN BELIEFS

Introduction

Debates over immigration in the US can be divided into two broad categories: legal immigration, including numbers and sources of immigrants, citizenship rules, refugee and asylum seeking processes; and illegal immigration, including border security, family detention issues, and other policies dealing with immigrants in the US illegally. Legal and illegal immigration issues are, of course, connected, in terms of both politics and policy. Note also that even the words we use to describe the phenomenon are controversial: we follow the practice of the Associated Press of referring to persons in the US illegally as “undocumented immigrants” instead of “illegals,” “illegal aliens,” or “illegal immigrants.”

This issue navigator explores illegal immigration issues by giving you the chance to investigate statistics around immigration, learn about contemporary political debates on immigration issues, and articulate your own views on immigration.