We evaluate how intensified interior immigration enforcement impacts the likelihood that children of unauthorized immigrants will repeat a grade or drop out of school. Using a weighted index of the intensity of interior immigration enforcement at the MSA level, we find that increased enforcement has the largest impact on younger children ages 6 to 13. The estimates, which account for the non-random residential location of children and their families, reveal that increased enforcement raises young children's probability of repeating a grade by 6 percent and their likelihood of dropping out of school by 25.2 percent.

The past two decades have witnessed an unprecedented increase in interior immigration enforcement that may have adversely impacted the children of unauthorized migrants—the vast majority of whom are U.S.‐born citizens. Using 2000 through 2013 data from the Current Population Survey, we gauge the impact that intensified interior immigration enforcement in the United States is having on the schooling progression of Hispanic youth with likely unauthorized parents. Intensified enforcement raises the probability of repeating a grade for children ages 6–13 by 14%, and the likelihood of dropping out of school for youth ages 14–17 by 18%. Furthermore, younger children are more responsive to police‐based enforcement, whereas older youth are more responsive to employment‐based enforcement. Awareness of the impacts that current immigration policies have on the children of immigrants is critical in informing the policy debate and in protecting the well‐being of children.

The 2000s have witnessed an expansion of interior immigration enforcement in the United States. At the same time, the country has experienced a major demographic transformation, with the number of U.S. citizens living in mixed-status households-that is, households where at least one family member is an unauthorized migrant-reaching 16 million. U.S. citizens living in mixed-status households are personally connected to the struggles experienced by their unauthorized family members. For them, immigration policy is likely to shape their current and future voting behavior. Using data from the 2002-2014 Current Population Survey Voting and Registration Supplements, we examine whether intensified immigration enforcement has affected the political engagement of U.S. citizens living in mixed-status households. We find that immigration enforcement has chilled their electoral participation by lowering their propensity to register by 5 %; however, it has not visibly affected their voting propensity among those registered. Importantly, their lower voting registration likelihood does not seem to reflect indifference for community and public matters, given that it has been accompanied by greater involvement in civic forms of political participation, such as volunteering. Understanding how immigration policy affects the political participation of a fast-growing segment of the electorate is imperative because they will inevitably constitute a rapidly rising political force in future elections.

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