The FIFA 2026 World Cup, co-hosted by the United States, Mexico, and Canada, is the largest in history and first to be co-organized by three countries. Yet for international fans, ever stricter U.S. immigration admissions and enforcement policies have introduced layers of uncertainty around whether they can attend at all.

In this episode of World of Migration, host Ariel G. Ruiz Soto speaks with veteran sports journalist Albert Samaha about the World Cup and what its lessons might hold for the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. They discuss how travel restrictions could affect fans and players from countries including Iran, Haiti, Senegal, and Côte d'Ivoire, fears of immigration enforcement on attendance, and what the World Cup experience may reveal ahead of the 2028 Summer Olympics.

Climate change can be devastating for individuals’ health and safety. Climate-linked natural disasters can cause physical injuries and damage health-care systems, while slow-onset changes such as sea-level rise can lead to the spread of disease and make it harder for people to obtain care.

In that context, leaving a climate-vulnerable place can potentially lead to better health outcomes—but only under the right circumstances.

In this episode, we speak with Ilse Ruyssen, an economist at Ghent University and the UN University Institute on Comparative Regional Integration Studies, who leads the CliMigHealth research network.

Chapters

01:19 Health Vulnerability among Climate Migrants

05:13 Groups at Highest Risk

08:36 When Migration Protects Health

11:51 How Climate Change Directly Harms Health

17:02 Strain on Health-Care Systems

22:18 Countering the "Migrants as Health Risk" Narrative

25:48 Mental Health and Climate Displacement

27:48 What to Do?

Cuba is facing one of its deepest economic crises in decades, and the United States has significantly narrowed the legal pathways that once made it the primary destination for Cuban migrants. As a result, migration patterns are shifting across the Americas in ways the region is not yet prepared to manage. In this episode of World of Migration, host Valerie Lacarte speaks with María José Espinosa Carrillo, Executive Director of Center for Engagement and Advocacy in the Americas (CEDA), about Cuba's deteriorating conditions, the dismantling of preferential U.S. immigration protections, and where Cubans are heading now.

Climate change is making home insurance more expensive and less available, as the multibillion-dollar losses caused by hurricanes, wildfires, and other disasters increase in scale. Rising insurance premiums can push some people to relocate or force others to either pay more money to remain in their home or go without insurance and risk catastrophe if disaster strikes. Residents, insurance companies, and policymakers in high-income countries are beginning to reckon with these issues and are working to find a way to adequately offset risk without charging exorbitant prices. This episode features Talley Burley, who analyzes climate risk and insurance at the Environmental Defense Fund.

Subscribe to Changing Climate, Changing Migration on Apple, Spotify or YouTube.

Chapters

02:17 How Climate Change Is Raising Insurance Costs

Refugees are often some of the people most vulnerable to climate change. After fleeing armed conflict or persecution, many refugees end up in camps located in rural areas, with few resources and little support. That can leave them vulnerable to floods, storms, extreme heat, or other impacts of climate change.

This episode focuses on these impacts, with insights from Ayoo Irene Hellen, a South Sudanese refugee in Uganda and climate advocate. She discusses her own experiences, those of her community, and the value of including refugee voices in planning.

Want to dive deeper? Listen to an earlier episode speaking with the UN refugee agency’s special advisor on climate action: https://mpichangingclimatechangingmigration.podbean.com/e/no-climate-refugees-but-still-a-role-for-the-un-refugee-agency/ 

All of MPI’s work on climate migration is here: https://www.migrationpolicy.org/topics/climate-change 

00:00 Intro 

02:45 Climate impacts on refugee settlements in Uganda

09:32 Legal and socioeconomic barriers to climate adaptation

16:52 Exclusion of refugees from climate policy processes

19:21 Refugee-led community resilience strategies

23:11 Climate challenges upon return: The case of South Sudan

27:24 Closing thoughts: co-creation and refugee inclusion

Why has immigration become so politically divisive – and why is it so difficult for governments to design policies that satisfy both public concerns and economic needs?

In this episode, MPI’s Meghan Benton speaks with Madeleine Sumption, Director of the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford and a member of the UK's Migration Advisory Committee. Drawing on insights from her new book, What Is Immigration Policy For?, she explains why immigration policy involves trade-offs between economic, humanitarian, and political goals—and why these tensions often lead to public dissatisfaction. The episode also examines challenges in regulating unauthorized migration and spontaneous asylum flows, the limits of deterrence policies, and decisions around low-wage labor migration.

Nearly 28 million U.S. residents, more than half of whom are U.S. citizens, reported limited proficiency in English as of 2023. How government agencies at all levels communicate with multilingual publics can have significant consequences for public safety and emergency responses, access to public information and services, community well-being, and the overall effectiveness of government programs.

Amid a shifting landscape, with the Trump administration enshrining English as the official language and dismantling language access initiatives across federal agencies, the work of state and local governments in this area over the past two decades is taking on even greater relevance.  

While longstanding federal civil-rights requirements to provide language access remain in place, the changes coming out of Washington in this policy area have created uncertainty and confusion. 

This webinar from MPI’s National Center on Immigrant Integration Policy, which has long mapped the language access policy landscape, exploreS the role of state and local policies in today’s rapidly changing national policy context. Experts assess opportunities for state and local stakeholders to support and expand their language access policies and programs. The webinar accompanies the release of the report, New Frameworks for Language Access: Tracking the Expansion & Features of State & Local Laws & Policies.

Speakers include:

www.migrationpolicy.org

As states begin to take up the U.S. Secretary of Education’s offer to apply for waivers to their obligations under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) of 2015, there are significant implications for English Learner (EL) students around the country.

In July 2025, the U.S. Department of Education issued a letter encouraging states to seek waivers to their federal mandate to improve student academic achievement and maximize the impact of federal education funding. One state, Iowa, received waiver approval, and several other states have begun the waiver request process. 

ESSA outlines statutory requirements that not only fund public education, but also provide guardrails to ensure all students, regardless of their background or community, have access to a quality education that prepares them to achieve in today’s world. The law also grants the Secretary of Education the authority to waive certain requirements outlined in the law, which has long been viewed as ensuring that ELs and all other students receive an equitable, quality education. 

While states have long had the ability to seek waivers, the Trump administration’s efforts to end the federal role in education, including by diminishing civil-rights oversight of schools, and attempts to cut program funding for particular populations, such as ELs, underscore the importance of understanding the potential implications of these actions for ELs and their communities.

This webinar brings together a panel of experts to discuss the ESSA waiver process and requirements, an overview of current state waivers and their objectives, and what these developments mean in practice for ELs and the schools they attend. 

Speakers include:

More information: www.migrationpolicy.org

As humanitarian protection needs grow amid near-record displacement globally, labor migration pathways offer another route to safety and stability for qualified refugees while helping meet destination countries’ skill needs. In practice, however, qualified refugees can struggle to qualify for work visas due to poorly designed frameworks or operational practices. The circumstances of their displacement can make it impossible to meet certain requirements, such as providing a valid passport or original proof of qualifications or traveling for necessary appointments. And employers and visa applicants alike can be deterred from using these pathways because of cumbersome procedures, complex requirements, and unpredictable results.

As countries across Europe and beyond explore reforms to their labor pathways to attract sought-after talent, and civil-society actors push to expand protection opportunities, this MPI Europe webinar explored ways to make work visas more accessible to qualified refugees. 

Speakers examined the barriers that prevent refugees from successfully applying for work visas and assessed initiatives and practices that aim to close this gap. They will discussed concrete policy design changes and practical solutions to help make visa systems more accessible and predictable—benefiting not only refugee workers, but employers and all applicants alike. The webinar marked the launch of Building Refugee-Inclusive Labour Mobility Pathways: A visa evaluation framework and accompanying scorecard that give policymakers a framework to understand how accessible different work visas are for refugee candidates and opportunities for reforms that can achieve these twin goals of addressing labor shortage and protection needs. 

This webinar was organized as part of the Skills, Talent, and Empowerment through Pathways (STEP) project, which focuses on developing and expanding labor mobility channels for displaced workers, in particular those to Ireland, Italy, and Spain. STEP is co-funded by the European Union’s Asylum, Migration, and Integration Fund (AMIF).

Speakers included:

More information: www.migrationpolicy.org

With the world’s lowest fertility rate and one of the fastest-aging populations, South Korea is confronting a shrinking workforce and mounting economic pressures. Immigration has become part of the policy conversation, but questions remain about how much it can help and how Korean society will adapt to diversity.

In this World of Migration episode, our Lawrence Huang speaks with Juyoung Jang, chief of the Policy Research Department at the Migration Research and Training Center in South Korea, about the rapid shift from being a country of emigration to one of immigration. They discuss how migration to South Korea has evolved over the past decades, how the government is expanding pathways for workers and international students, and what challenges migrants encounter – from housing and language barriers to social acceptance. Looking ahead, they consider what the next 10 to 20 years could bring as immigration, integration, and demographic change reshape South Korean society.