Research Library

In June 2023, the international boundary treaty governing the U.S.-Mexico border came under attack from Gov. Greg Abbott’s Operation Lonestar. In a new research paper, nonresident scholars Stephen Mumme and Regina M. Buono outline the treaty’s history and examine key issues — advising on merits of recent challenges and long-term implications for the binational relationship between the United States and Mexico.

A new widespread immigrant amnesty would grow the wages of currently undocumented immigrants by 4%-5% — adding roughly $14 billion per year in labor market earnings, writes contributor Hugh Cassidy.

This report takes a deep dive into how expanding the scope of the nonimmigrant TN Visa — available only to Mexican and Canadian citizens — could help solve the U.S. labor shortage. In a political climate where full-scale immigration reform seems impossible, more temporary work visas can help bridge the labor gap.

Nonresident scholar Richard Kilroy explores how Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s decision to move the Guardia Nacional — an institution created to protect public safety — under the control of Mexico’s military could have dire consequences for civil-military relations and U.S.-Mexico security relations.

This paper analyzes the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats facing Mexico's new National Guard amid ongoing public health and safety crises and growing nationalism in Mexico and the United States.

In this paper, the author examines past attempts at immigration reform in the United States, especially as they pertain to the nation’s undocumented population. Analyzing these early reform efforts could be deeply instructive for the prospects of President Biden’s U.S. Citizenship Act and reveals both durable patterns and new developments that could shape the chances for legislative breakthroughs.

José Iván Rodríguez-Sánchez conducts a cost-benefit analysis of undocumented immigrants in Texas, concluding that undocumented residents have a positive influence and impact on the economy, since they pay taxes and fees and constitute an important part of the labor market.

By Luis Alfredo Arriola Vega The election of Mexico's Andrés Manuel López Obrador and the increase in Central American migrant caravans require reevaluating immigration policy, writes the author.

The author gives an overview of the USMCA's implications for Mexico, finding that while challenges remain for the U.S.-Mexico relationship, the possibility of the trade agreement going into effect by 2020 should greatly reduce uncertainties about the future of North American trade.

In separate papers, two Baker Institute fellows — one Palestinian, the other Israeli — provide their perspectives on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.