The Trump Effect: US Immigration Policy and Transit Migrants in Central America

Abstract

Executive Summary

This paper studies the effect of destination state immigration policy shifts on the behavior and perceptions of migrants in transit. We leverage a novel survey of over 40,000 migrants in transit through Central America between 2021 and 2025 to examine their behavioral and attitudinal responses to shifts in United States (US) immigration policy under the US administrations of Presidents Joseph Biden and Donald Trump. Our research examines how intentions among transit migrants heading northward—principally to the US—alter in response to a promised change in US border and immigration policies. We find that, after Trump’s inauguration, migrant intentions to enter the US significantly subsided, along with northbound trajectories more broadly. However, migrants traveling with children and migrants moving for economic reasons were less deterred than others. As a result, the “Trump Effect” did not produce uniform deterrence but rather intensified the perception of risk among US-bound migrants.

Our research suggests that:

Migrants are sensitive not only to restrictive policy, but to the threat of a restrictive and unwelcoming environment,;

Even under the most restrictive policy conditions, a minority of migrants will continue with their journeys;

Restrictive border policies in destination states will apply greater demographic pressure on the societies and economies of safe alternative destinations like Costa Rica;

Mexico’s appeal as an alternative destination for migrants may be contingent on the openness of the US Southern Border;

Uncertainty about long-run policy effectiveness remains given the persistence of humanitarian and geopolitical risks that the US may not be able to control.