Outlet profile

American Immigration Council

U.S. center-left / pro-immigrant advocacy

Owned byIndependent 501(c)(3) nonprofit; founded as the policy and legal arm affiliated with the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA), with which it remains closely linked though it operates as a separate organization

FundingFoundation grants and donations, including from the Ford Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and Bloomberg Family Foundation, plus individual donors; reported roughly $12 million in revenue in 2024; finances are publicly disclosed via IRS filings

On the administrationbroadly critical

Background

Founded in 1987 as the American Immigration Law Foundation by the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA), the group rebranded as the American Immigration Council in 2008 to reflect a broader mission beyond legal education, including research and public advocacy. In 2021 it absorbed the New American Economy, a bipartisan research initiative, expanding its economic-research output. The Council runs a legal team that regularly sues federal agencies, publishes reports on immigration enforcement and economics, and operates the Immigration Impact blog. It is widely viewed as pro-immigration in orientation, consistently advocating for expanded legal pathways and against restrictive enforcement measures, which has drawn criticism from restrictionist groups like the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) that call it an advocacy group rather than a neutral research body. Since the start of the second Trump administration in January 2025, the Council has filed or joined multiple lawsuits challenging policies such as the immigrant registration rule, asylum restrictions, and changes to the Board of Immigration Appeals, positioning it as a leading legal adversary of the administration's immigration agenda.

Sources

Profile compiled 2026-10-02; refreshed when ownership, funding, or the administration changes.

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