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Who Are the Millions of Immigrants Trump Wants to Deport?

Published

1 year ago

January 18, 2025

Who Are the Millions of Immigrants Trump Wants to Deport?

President-elect Trump has promised to deport millions of people who are living in the United States without permission. This population is commonly referred to as “undocumented,” “unauthorized” or “illegal.” But these terms are not entirely accurate. A significant number are in the country with temporary permissions — though many are set to expire during Mr. Trump’s term.

For the last decade, the best estimates put this population at around 11 million. But the number of people crossing U.S. borders reached a record level in 2022 before falling last year. More recent estimates put the number of people without legal status or with temporary protection from deportation at almost 14 million in 2024.

Many of them have permission to be here, at least for now.

“It’s true that immigration is high, but it’s hard to sort out who is an undocumented immigrant,” said Robert Warren, a demographer and the former statistics director at what was then the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service. “Most of the public looks at everyone as undocumented — asylum-seekers, T.P.S., DACA — but it’s important to really figure out who is included.”

The New York Times compared estimates from several research organizations and the federal government, as well as more recent administrative data, to better understand who these immigrants are, how they got here, and which of them may be most vulnerable to deportation under Mr. Trump.

Those with permission fall under the protection of many different programs.

What is perhaps most surprising — or misleading — about terms like “undocumented” and “unauthorized” is that as many as 40 percent of the people in this group do have some current authorization to live or work legally in the United States, according to one estimate by FWD.us, an immigration advocacy group that hired a demographer to study the population.

In an effort to deter illegal crossings, the Biden administration created a way for migrants to make an appointment to cross the southern border through a smartphone app called CBP One. The administration also created special pathways for people fleeing humanitarian crises in Afghanistan, Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, Ukraine and Venezuela and extended temporary protection from deportation for people from certain countries through a program known as Temporary Protected Status.

Immigrants who enter the country through these programs are following the current rules, but Mr. Trump and other Republicans have attacked them and said the programs are illegal.

Millions more people have applied for asylum and are allowed to remain in the country while their cases wend through immigration court — though very few asylum claims are ultimately granted. An Obama-era program known as DACA protects from deportation about 540,000 undocumented people brought to the country as children.

The Biden administration also deferred deportation for other groups of people, like those who have applied for protection because they were victims of or witnesses to a crime.

Trump has limited power to immediately remove these groups.

Many of the permissions offering humanitarian relief are set to expire during the Trump administration, including some that Mr. Biden recently extended. If the incoming administration were to try to end these protections sooner, it would likely face lawsuits.

Mr. Trump could immediately stop accepting new applications for humanitarian parole. It may be harder to cancel the status of those who are already here.

Nor can Mr. Trump easily deport the 2.6 million people who are awaiting a hearing or a decision on an asylum claim. He could try to hire more immigration judges to decide these cases, but even with a significant infusion of new funds, it would take years to work through the backlog.

DACA is no longer accepting new applications, and the future of the program is uncertain because of a lawsuit filed by several Republican state attorneys general.

People can have more than one status, and many of these groups overlap.

Many people in the country with temporary permission fall under overlapping programs.

For example, the bulk of the people who arrived through one of the Biden-era humanitarian pathways were granted parole for two years. Many of them now also have Temporary Protected Status. Along with those who used the CBP One app to cross the southern border, they can also apply for asylum within the first year they are in the United States.

These immigrants come from all over the world.

Note: Not all countries are shown. Data as of 2022. The growth shown for select countries is based on administrative data.

Source: Pew Research Center.

More than half of those who are in the United States without authorization have been here for 10 years or more.

Mexicans remain by far the largest group of people living in the country without authorization, but their share has declined significantly since the 1990s, according to data from the Pew Research Center.

An influx of people fleeing humanitarian and economic crises came from Central America during Mr. Trump’s first term, and many of them are still in the country.

Mexican officials and other leaders in the region say they have not been able to meet with the incoming administration about its deportation plans.

Few immigrants can be swiftly removed. Even fewer are in custody.

Out of all those who are unauthorized, Mr. Trump has said the top priority for deportation will be criminals. There are around 655,000 noncitizens living in the U.S. with criminal convictions or pending charges, according to data from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, though many of these charges are for minor offenses such as traffic violations.

There were about 39,000 immigrants in ICE custody at the end of December, near capacity for holding facilities.

The Trump administration may also focus its enforcement efforts on the nearly 1.4 million people whom an immigration judge has already ordered to be removed from the country.

Many of the rest have been living in the country for years and have developed ties to their communities, including having children born in the United States. It would require a significant amount of time and resources to locate and remove them.

Methodology and sources

There is no direct measure of the population living in the United States without authorization, as no major government survey collects information on immigration status.

In order to estimate the size of the unauthorized population, most researchers rely on a method that starts with survey data from the Census Bureau and then adjusts it using administrative records and other data to subtract the number of immigrants who are legally in the country from the total number of foreign-born residents.

Recent estimates of the unauthorized population

The number of people waiting for an asylum claim comes from the Pew Research Center as of 2023. The number of people with Temporary Protected Status comes from the Congressional Research Service as of September 2024. The number of DACA recipients comes from U.S.C.I.S. as of September 2024. Figures for the number of people who have entered through humanitarian parole from specific countries and through a CBP One appointment at the southern border are from C.B.P as of December 2024. Many people may be counted in more than one of these groups.

Figures for the number of ICE cases pending and paused are for the national docket and come from the agency’s annual report as of September 2024. The number of noncitizens with a criminal charge or conviction comes from ICE, as of Jan. 8.

All numbers are rounded.

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Commercial Ships Transit Strait of Hormuz as U.S. Blockades Iran’s Ports

Published

4 hours ago

April 14, 2026

Press Room

Commercial Ships Transit Strait of Hormuz as U.S. Blockades Iran’s Ports

More than 20 commercial ships have passed through the Strait of Hormuz in the past 24 hours, according to two U.S. officials. The development comes as the U.S. [enforces a blockade](https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/iran-us-cease-fire-talks-stalled-2026/card/u-s-central-command-says-no-ships-have-pas

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Video: How Stephen Miller Is Adjusting Trump’s Immigration Agenda

Published

14 hours ago

April 14, 2026

Press Room

Video: How Stephen Miller Is Adjusting Trump’s Immigration Agenda

After the chaos and death that ensued during the deportation raids in Minneapolis, Stephen Miller, the architect of President Trump’s mass deportation campaign, is changing course on immigration. Our White House correspondent Zolan Kanno-Youngs explains how the administration’s strategy is shifting.

By Zolan Kanno-Youngs, Gilad Thaler, Jon Miller, Nikolay Nikolov, June Kim, Paul Abowd and Pierre Kattar

April 14, 2026

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Man accused in Molotov cocktail attack of OpenAI CEO’s home charged with attempted murder

Published

16 hours ago

April 14, 2026

Press Room

Man accused in Molotov cocktail attack of OpenAI CEO’s home charged with attempted murder

Matt Cobo, F.B.I. San Francisco Acting Special Agent in Charge ( right) speaks next to San Francisco Police Chief Derrick Lew (second from right) and San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins (third from right) during a news conference Monday, April 13, 2026, in San Francisco.

Jeff Chiu/AP

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Jeff Chiu/AP

SAN FRANCISCO — The man accused of throwing a Molotov cocktail at OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s home had written about AI’s purported risk to humanity and traveled from Texas to San Francisco intending to kill Altman, authorities said Monday.

Authorities allege 20-year-old Daniel Moreno-Gama threw the incendiary device about 4 a.m. Friday, setting an exterior gate at Altman’s home alight before fleeing on foot, police said. Less than an hour later, Moreno-Gama allegedly went to OpenAI’s headquarters about 3 miles (4.83 kilometers) away and threatened to burn down the building.

Moreno-Gama is opposed to artificial intelligence, writing about AI’s purported risk to humanity and “our impending extinction,” according to a federal criminal complaint.

What OpenAI's Sam Altman thinks of AI disaster scenarios

“This was not spontaneous. This was planned, targeted and extremely serious,” said FBI San Francisco Acting Special Agent in Charge Matt Cobo during a press conference.

No one was injured at Altman’s home or the company offices, authorities said.

Moreno-Gama faces state and federal charges

Moreno-Gama faces charges including two counts of attempted murder and attempted arson in California state court, San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins. He tried to kill both Altman and a security guard at Altman’s residence, she alleged. He is set to appear in court Tuesday, and online state court records do not yet show if he has an attorney.

Jenkins said the state charges carry penalties ranging from 19 years to life in prison.

On Monday morning, FBI agents went to Moreno-Gama’s home in Spring, Texas, a suburb of Houston, where they spent several hours before leaving. He has been charged by federal prosecutors with possession of an unregistered firearm and damage and destruction of property by means of explosives. Those charges carry respective penalties of up to 10 years and 20 years in prison.

The federal court documents do not list an attorney for Moreno-Gama, and he has not yet had his first appearance in federal court.

Authorities allege Moreno-Gama traveled from his home in Texas to San Francisco and visited Altman’s home early Friday morning.

Authorities say Moreno-Gama was opposed to artificial intelligence

When Moreno-Gama was arrested Friday, officials found a document on him in which he “identified views opposed to Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the executives of various AI companies,” court documents say. The document discussed AI’s purported risk to humanity and “our impending extinction,” according to the criminal complaint.

Surveillance video images included in the criminal complaint show a person dressed in a dark hoodie and pants that the FBI alleges is Moreno-Gama approaching the driveway of Altman’s home. In various images, the person can be seen tossing the Molotov cocktail, which landed at the top of a metal gate and started a small fire.

Surveillance video images from outside OpenAI’s headquarters allegedly show Moreno-Gama grabbing a chair and using it to hit a set of glass doors. Authorities said Moreno-Gama was approached by the building’s security personnel, who told investigators he “stated in sum and substance” that he came to the headquarters “to burn it down and kill anyone inside,” according to the complaint.

San Francisco police arrested Moreno-Gama and recovered “incendiary devices, a jug of kerosene, a blue lighter, and a document.” Moreno-Gama was being held Monday in the San Francisco County Jail on the state charges, and was expected to appear in court on Tuesday.

U.S. Attorney Craig Missakian said authorities “will treat this as an act of domestic terrorism, and together with our partners, prosecute him to the fullest extent of the law.”

Authorities say Moreno-Gama’s anti-AI document contained threats against Altman

The document in which Moreno-Gama discussed his opposition to AI also made threats against Altman, officials said.

“Also if I am going to advocate for others to kill and commit crimes, then I must lead by example and show that I am fully sincere in my message,” Moreno-Gama is alleged by authorities to have written in the document.

Advocacy groups that have issued grave warnings about AI’s risks to society condemned the violence.

Anthony Aguirre, president and CEO of the Future of Life Institute, said in a written statement Friday that “violence and intimidation of any kind have no place in the conversation about the future of AI.”

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman speaks in Washington, D.C., on July 22, 2025.

Another group, PauseAI, said in a statement that the suspect had no role in the group but joined its forum on the social media platform Discord about two years ago and posted about 34 messages there, none containing explicit calls to violence but one that was flagged as “ambiguous.”

Discord said Monday that it has banned Moreno-Gama for “off-platform behavior.”

Altman addressed the threats in a blog post

Hours after the attack on his house, Altman posted a photo of his husband and their toddler in a blog post addressing the threats against him.

“Normally we try to be pretty private, but in this case I am sharing a photo in the hopes that it might dissuade the next person from throwing a Molotov cocktail at our house, no matter what they think about me,” Altman wrote.

He added that “fear and anxiety about AI is justified” but it was important to “de-escalate the rhetoric and tactics and try to have fewer explosions in fewer homes, figuratively and literally.”

Altman has become a preeminent voice in Silicon Valley on the promise and potential dangers of artificial intelligence. The attack comes days after The New Yorker published an in-depth investigation that touched on concerns some people have about him and the company.

Debate about the impact of AI is growing

The attack came at a time of growing debate about the societal effects of AI assistants like OpenAI’s ChatGPT that millions of people are turning to for information, advice, writing help and to do work on their behalf.

An annual report published Monday by Stanford University called the AI index found that most people believe AI’s benefits outweigh its drawbacks, “but nervousness is growing and trust in institutions to manage the technology remains uneven.”