Rule Watch: U.S. immigration rulemaking in the Federal Register, 4 Nov 2025 – 3 Nov 2026 — a Strait Research dataset

86 Federal Register documents — proposed rules and final rules from immigration-relevant U.S. federal agencies (DHS, USCIS, ICE, CBP, EOIR, State, Labor, Justice, HHS) — published 28 October 2025 through 27 October 2026 and kept under a documented relevance filter applied to a 991-document pull from the Federal Register API v1 (retrieved 27 October 2026). Each record carries status (derived by a published rule), comment deadline, effective date, RIN, docket IDs, and links to the primary documents. Comment counts are not included: the source does not publish them in these records. Tool: https://rule-watch.straitresearch.org/ Direction and final calls by Athena Anthea; research judgment and technical execution shared with an AI assistant. Version 1.1 (October 24, 2026) adds: comment counts from regulations.gov for 50 of the 87 records (regulations.gov API via an api.data.gov key registered by Athena Anthea on October 24, 2026, held in a secure connector; counts as of October 24, 2026); a rulemaking-lineage layer (9 chains covering 18 records, threaded by RIN and docket); an older-still-open supplement file (0 records — the regulations.gov search of October 24, 2026 found no pre-window immigration document still open for comment in the nine agency families searched); and comment-deadline/effective-date alert feeds (RSS and iCalendar) published on the tool page. Version 1.2 (October 24, 2026) adds a comment-impact layer (comment-chains.csv / .json): for two completed rulemakings (Public Charge, USCIS-2025-0304; EAD automatic extension, USCIS-2025-0271), 17 hand-built topic dictionaries ('asks') were matched by keyword against retrieved comment texts (200 and 198 texts) and each ask was scored against the final rule's response-to-comments preamble with a verbatim quote. Result: 0 moved, 0 partially moved, 17 no movement, 0 indeterminate. Twelve dockets were attempted in comment-count rank order; the other ten had no completed final rule to score against. Full methods, dictionaries, and the 87-record coverage table are in DOCUMENTATION.md. Version 1.3 (October 27, 2026) is the weekly refresh: the trailing-12-month window moves to 28 October 2025 – 27 October 2026 (991 pulled, 86 kept); exactly one record aged out (2025-19655) and none was added; comment counts re-retrieved as of October 27, 2026 for 49 of 86 records (88,502 posted submissions in total); chains still 9 covering 18 records; the older-still-open supplement is still 0 records; alert feeds rebuilt (9 open comment periods, 1 future effective date). The v1.2 comment-impact layer is carried over unchanged and remains as of October 24, 2026. Version 1.4 (November 3, 2026) is the weekly refresh: the trailing-12-month window moves to 4 November 2025 – 3 November 2026 (1,010 pulled, 85 kept); two records aged out (2025-19702, 2025-19747) and one was added (2026-22089); comment counts re-retrieved as of November 3, 2026 for 48 of 85 records (89,820 posted submissions in total); chains 8 covering 16 records; the older-still-open supplement is still 0 records; alert feeds rebuilt (9 open comment periods, 1 future effective date). The v1.2 comment-impact layer is carried over unchanged and remains as of October 24, 2026.