This Week in Immigration Bipartisan Policy Center

In this week’s episode, BPC Associate Director Jack Malde interviews the Director of BPC’s Congress Project John Richter and BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown about a recent bipartisan visit to the southern border. The visit, arranged as part of BPC’s American Congressional Exchange (ACE) program, brought six members of Congress to the border to better understand the urgent challenges and opportunities for bipartisan cooperation on U.S. immigration and border policy. Theresa then chats to one of the members, Representative Nikki Budzinski (D-IL), about her thoughts on the trip and what she learned from it.  

The Bipartisan Policy Center’s American Congressional Exchange Program: https://bipartisanpolicy.org/project/american-congressional-exchange/ 

ACE Crosses the Border and Party Lines in Arizona and Nogales, Mexico: https://bipartisanpolicy.org/blog/ace-immigration-and-border-visit/ 
00:00 Intro
00:58 John Richter and Theresa on ACE Trip
34:22 Rep. Nikki Budzinski (D-IL) and Theresa on ACE Trip
 

In this week’s episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown talks with Michael Clemens, professor of economics at George Mason University, who has studied the economic causes and effects of migration all over the world. His latest research, based on detailed examination of border crossing data, shows that offering more lawful pathways to immigrants reduces unlawful border crossings. We also talk about the importance of good data for examining immigration policy and how traditional understandings of the linkages between migration and development may not be correct.  

Michael Clemens Bio: Economics | Faculty and Staff: Michael A Clemens (gmu.edu) 

PIIE Article: Offering more lawful pathways for US border crossings reduces unlawful crossings | PIIE 

Journal of Economic Perspectives Article: Economics and Emigration: Trillion-Dollar Bills on the Sidewalk? - American Economic Association (aeaweb.org) 

In this week’s episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown and Associate Director Jack Malde chat with Jason Wendle, an expert in migration and labor mobility. We speak about various initiatives that Jason is involved in that facilitate migration from lower-income to higher-income countries by increasing the use of existing migratory pathways. Such initiatives can benefit those on the move, the countries that welcome them, and the countries they (often temporarily) leave behind, without the need to change immigration law. 
The Migration Opportunity: https://globaldevincubator.org/initiative/the-migration-opportunity/ 

Labor Mobility Partnerships (LaMP): https://lampforum.org/ 

Malengo: https://malengo.org/ 

Talent Mobility Fund: https://www.talentmobility.fund/ 

In this week’s episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown and Senior Policy Analyst Jack Malde chat with Alexander Kustov, an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. We discuss Professor Kustov’s research on how we might, or might not, be able to shift public opinion in the United States to increase support for immigration. One promising approach, that will be the subject of Professor Kustov’s forthcoming book “In Our Interest: How to Make Immigration Popular”, is adopting demonstrably beneficial policies that make voters confident their government is managing immigration in their interest. 

In this week’s episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown and Senior Policy Analyst Jack Malde chat with Camille Mackler, the Founder and Executive Director of Immigrant ARC (I-ARC), a collaborative of over 80 legal service providers in New York State. I-ARC works with community leaders, legal service providers, state and local governments, law enforcement agencies, and Federal agencies and policymakers to ensure immigrants have access to a fair and efficient immigration system. We discuss I-ARC’s beginnings, the challenges it faces, its work helping newly arrived immigrants get work permits, and how federal, state, and local governments can help. 

Read more about I-ARC: https://www.immigrantarc.org/ 

In this week’s episode, BPC Senior Advisor Theresa Cardinal Brown and Senior Policy Analyst Jack Malde chat with Michael D. Lumpkin, the Chief of Staff for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or “ICE”. We discuss the missions of ICE, the various challenges facing ICE including budgetary constraints, and its efforts to address the unprecedented number of arrivals at the US-Mexico border. We also discuss the importance of technology and innovation in ICE’s operations and Mr. Lumpkin’s views looking forward.