Nonprofit Organizations in U.S. Immigration News

Immigration is high on the U.S. policy and news agenda, and thus important to public service organizations that provide assistance to migrants and advocate for immigration-related legislation. This longitudinal study analyzes 1,952 news sources and 445 other organizational information subsidies in 534 newspaper articles about immigration from the U.S.-Mexico border states of California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas, 1993–2022. Nonprofit (NPO) and nongovernmental organization (NGO) sources comprised 39.8% of sources, compared to 51.5% in government/politics and 7.8% in business. Among the six nonprofit categories, advocacy and human services NGOs/NPOs were most frequently quoted (41%), followed by academic institutions (21%), think tanks (15%), and legal aid societies (11%). Less visible were union/trade/professional association nonprofits (9%) and chambers of commerce (2%).