2025 was a year of dramatic change in our immigration system. One of the largest impacts was to our systems designed to protect people being persecuted worldwide. The Trump administration seems to be dismantling the systems that were created over half a century ago to try to avoid the mistakes made during the Second World War.
Every January, Presbyterian Disaster Assistance's Migration Accompaniment Ministry releases a report on the state of migration worldwide and in the U.S. Read this year’s report: A Guide to Migration Worldwide and in the U.S. This report is created with the goal to not just offer updates on the state of the world, but also offer opportunities for congregations and individual Presbyterians to learn more about the issues.
It is no surprise that much of the news surrounding these systems has been negative.
In the Biden administration the refugee ceiling was set at 125,000 admissions a year. Under the current Trump administration, the refugee ceiling for 2026 has been set at 7,500 – the lowest admission ceiling in the program’s history. The administration has also indicated that white South Africans part of the Afrikaners ethnicity would be the priority. This new admissions ceiling for 2026 puts people’s lives in danger by keeping them in unsecure areas and is unjust to many refugees who have been in the process; some of whom have been in the long process that has an average wait time of 20 years.
In 2025 there were many changes to the asylum process, under both the Biden administration and 2nd Trump administration, the president has taken measures to ensure that the border is closed to those seeking safety and the numbers reflect that.
Other immigration statuses have been affected. In 2025 the Processes for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans (CHNV) sponsorship program was terminated by the administration. TPS has also been rescinded for several countries:
2025 has also been marked by an unprecedented wave of 287(g) agreements with local and state law enforcement. 287(g) agreements are agreements where state and local governments collaborate with the Department of Homeland Security on immigration enforcement. The agreements deputize state and local law enforcement as immigration agents, allowing them to question people’s immigration status among other authorizations. These laws have been shown to racially profile people. Under this program, law enforcement is not well-trained in the nuances of the different immigration statuses, and Department of Homeland Security does not provide proper oversight. These agreements only make our communities more unsafe by making people afraid to come forward to cooperate with law enforcement; for example, not coming forward to report crimes and refusing to come forward as witnesses of a crime making law enforcement work harder.
Overall, the outlook for migration is a bleak one based on what has happened in 2025. However, there is some hope. Several of the changes mentioned above are being challenged in court. The PC(USA) has entered a lawsuit that, if successful, would restore churches as a place where ICE cannot enforce. There are also countless congregations and many mid-councils that are engaging in the work of accompanying our migrant community members in these tough times.
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