Imagine that you are applying for a grant for an innovative project to help undocumented
Flint water crisis survivors or undocumented parents in the sanctuary, Or undocumented elders get either better health care or legal advocacy.
Choose one issue and one undocumented group and focus on one chapter in the last half of the book
The term ‘undocumented immigrant’ refers to anyone residing in any given country without legal documentation. It includes people who entered the U.S. without inspection and proper permission from the government, and those who entered with a legal visa that is no longer valid.
The easy definition of an undocumented immigrant is a foreign-born person who doesn’t have a legal right to be or remain in the United States. But that’s where the easy part stops. Let’s look at some common questions and misconceptions about undocumented immigrants.
Theoretically yes, but “illegal alien” is not a technical term. It’s popularly used jargon, nowhere found in the U.S. immigration laws. Because of its insulting connotations, however, we at Nolo prefer to use more neutral terms like “undocumented immigrant” or “unauthorized immigrant.”
In fact, the immigration reform bill proposed by President Joe Biden would remove the term “alien” from U.S. immigration law and replace it with “noncitizen.”
Estimates place the number of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. at between approximately 10.5 and 12 million. Of course, it’s an impossible number to know precisely, since this is a population that attempts to stay under the radar.
Some, but not all. Although accurate numbers are hard to come by, it’s clear that a significant number of undocumented immigrants originally came to the U.S. legally from various countries, whether as tourists or on some other nonimmigrant (temporary) visa. Then they failed to leave after the expiration date of their permitted stay arrived.