Meet the Scholars Producing Critical Country Conditions Reports at the Migration & Asylum Lab

Join me for a conversation with Elliott Young and Seraya Talbott-Carey from Lewis & Clark's Migration & Asylum Lab about documenting country conditions while the Trump admin strips key information.

At a time when the Trump administration is systematically stripping critical information from State Department human rights reports—removing entire sections on LGBTQ+ discrimination, gender-based violence, and government corruption—two scholars at Lewis & Clark College are doing the crucial work that could mean life or death for asylum seekers. Elliott Young and Seraya Talbott-Carey from the college's Migration & Asylum Lab have just released two 2025 country conditions bulletins with more forthcoming—and their timing couldn't be more crucial.

Elliott Young, a history professor who has provided expert witness testimony in over 700 asylum cases, co-directs the Migration & Asylum Lab alongside Stanford's Ana Minian. Seraya Talbott-Carey, who brings deep cross-cultural experience from years living and working in Latin America, contributes her expertise on regional conditions and migration patterns. Together, they're producing the kind of rigorous, unvarnished research that immigration courts desperately need—and that government sources are increasingly unwilling to provide.

📆 Join me for a conversation with Elliott and Seraya on August 21, 2025, at 1:00 PM Eastern time. The Zoom registration page is available here, and registration is required. Audience participation is highly encouraged!

Country conditions reports serve as the backbone of asylum cases, helping immigration judges understand whether someone faces a credible threat of persecution back home. These documents can make the difference between protection and deportation. But as NPR recently reported, the 2025 State Department country reports are on average one-third shorter than the previous year's, with systematic removal of information about LGBTQ+ rights, women's rights, and government corruption.

For example, El Salvador's latest report now claims “no credible reports of significant human rights abuses”, despite reports last year that documented torture and gender-based violence. These notable absences come at a time when Bukele has worked closely with Trump to facilitate migrant disappearances to CECOT.

This is where researchers like Young and Talbott-Carey connect scholarly analysis to public impact. Their lab produces meticulously researched bulletins on conditions in Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Venezuela, and Cuba, with recent attention to Ecuador and Nicaragua. Working with students in Young's Public History Lab, they document the exact kinds of persecution and discrimination that official reports now omit.

Their work acknowledges the inherent limitations of country conditions reporting—the difficulty of accessing reliable information, the challenge of staying current with rapidly changing conditions, and yes, the political dimensions that can shape any documentation effort. But their commitment to scholarly rigor and independence offers research you can trust at a time when government reports are becoming increasingly politicized, incomplete, and untrustworthy.

We'll explore how their latest bulletins document conditions that asylum seekers face, why this work matters more than ever under current policies, and how academic research can fill the gaps left by diminished government reporting. Join us for what promises to be an essential conversation about truth, documentation, and the fight for asylum protection in 2025.

Ahead of the event, check out the Migration & Asylum Lab's recently released Ecuador Country Bulletin 2025 and Nicaragua Country Bulletin 2025—comprehensive reports documenting the exact kinds of conditions and persecution that asylum seekers face, and that government sources are increasingly reluctant to acknowledge.

More about Elliot’s work. He is the author of "Forever Prisoners," a powerful history of U.S. immigrant detention, and brings decades of scholarship on transnational migration to this work. His expertise spans from historical analysis to contemporary conditions, making him uniquely qualified to contextualize current threats within broader patterns of persecution.

Beyond his individual research, Young helped launch the Migration Scholar Collaborative—a network of academics working to bridge scholarship and practice in immigration law, which I am also a part of. The collaborative provides expert witnesses for asylum cases, produces amicus briefs for key court decisions, and publishes accessible analysis that helps reporters, advocates, and the public understand current immigration developments within their historical context. It's part of a broader movement of scholars stepping up to fill the knowledge gaps left by reduced government transparency.

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