With its aggressive mass deportation campaign, the Trump administration is attempting to reshape long-standing U.S. immigration policy — and increasingly defying constitutional guardrails in the process.

On this episode, experts examine the legal and social implications of the administration’s unconventional targeting of legal permanent and temporary residents, asylum seekers, and even foreign students, and well as the administration’s overt challenges to judicial authority and due process rights.

Host David Satterfield was joined by Tony Payan, director of the Baker Institute Center for the U.S. and Mexico; Luz Maria Garcini, assistant professor of psychological sciences at Rice University and director of the Center for Community and Public Health at Rice’s Kinder Institute for Urban Research; and David Donatti, a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Texas and lecturer at Rice.

This conversation was recorded on April 21, 2025, in front of a live studio audience. Learn about future live recordings of the “Baker Briefing” podcast by subscribing to our “Events Digest” newsletter at https://www.bakerinstitute.org/newsletter.

You can follow @BakerInstitute on X, Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube, and learn more about our data-driven, nonpartisan policy research and analysis at bakerinstitute.org.