Why Has Illegal Immigration Dropped from the Media Radar?

President Donald Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, promising to end the free-flowing illegal immigration that so exemplified his predecessor’s time in office. The numbers show he has done just that. Notably, considering this was one of the top issues in the 2024 election, discussion of illegal crossings seems to have disappeared from the front pages of the nation’s leading media outlets. Why might that be?

Illegal Immigration by the Numbers

Illegal border crossings are down dramatically from Joe Biden’s last year in office. Reuters reports that for the year ending February 2026, just 86,000 people were apprehended at the US-Mexico border, down from a whopping almost one million the year before. Additionally, in March this year, an average of 1,000 illegal immigrants were arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on a daily basis.

On top of this, Trump’s cancellation of the CBP One app for processing asylum requests and his ongoing shutdown of access to public funds by illegal migrants have encouraged an estimated two million people to voluntarily “self-deport.”

The ramifications of this full-court press, especially regarding the upcoming 2030 census and how congressional seats are divided, cannot be overstated. So, it seems a little strange that the leading media purveyors of the day appear to have ditched the topic entirely.

No News is Good News?

It is no secret that Trump is suffering in the polls. With the Iran war ongoing, and the subsequent hike in oil prices, he is taking hits on just about every issue of importance. And yet, his most stable approval rating is his performance on illegal immigration.

Certainly, there is a mass of surveys suggesting the president is doing “too much” in this area. Pew Research Center states, “About half of U.S. adults (52%) say the Trump administration is doing too much to deport immigrants who are living in the country illegally.” And while much of the dissatisfaction is driven by Democratic voters hardening their stance against Trump in general, there is a significant uptick (28%) in those who “now say the administration is doing too little.”

Overall, according to Liberty Nation News’ Public Square polling aggregator, just over 51% disapprove of his handling of the situation, against almost 46% who approve. What the survey numbers don’t say is why.

One might think that this gray area would be worth some haymaking by the nakedly partisan Fourth Estate. A good search shows otherwise.

A Missing Issue

Using search terms like “illegal,” “immigrant,” “undocumented,” and “border,” we can see that today, May 21, outlets including The Washington Post, The New York Times, CNN, and ABCNews have precisely zero coverage on the digital edition front pages. If we dig deeper into the search functions, we can see a massive drop-off in stories of this nature.

Considering that in the run-up to the 2024 election immigration was the hot-button issue, it is more than surprising that it appears to have effectively been buried by the nation’s press. Do Americans not care about illegal immigration anymore? Or is something else at play?

Although Trump’s approval on the matter is not high, it’s a nuanced position. Voters massively favor deporting those with a criminal past (other than illegally crossing the border), but are less thrilled with the eggs that must be cracked to achieve such aims. Data suggest that for every hardened criminal arrested by ICE, more “non-criminal” aliens are scooped up. It comes down to a question of how it should be presented.

Making the case that murderers and sex offenders should remain in the country because the operation to remove them would negatively impact otherwise law-abiding illegal aliens is a tough sell. There is little doubt that US citizens are better off without violent criminals being granted leave to remain. It’s a tricky needle to thread for a left-leaning press determined to help its favored party win the upcoming midterms.

If the Fourth Estate denizens open the door to discussion on illegal immigration, it provides an opportunity to put forth the argument that America is indeed quantifiably safer because of Trump’s actions. And that is a message that could damage Democrats in November. For Donald Trump, it’s a rare verifiable win that actually impacts just about every voter. No wonder it’s being kept on the down low.