Axios PM

March 26, 2026
🌭 Happy Opening Day! Today's newsletter, edited by Alex Fitzpatrick, is 697 words, a 2½-min. read. Thanks to Sheryl Miller for copy editing.
1 big thing: Growth slows as immigration plummets

Population growth is slowing in most counties nationwide amid a big drop in immigration, Alex Fitzpatrick reports from census data out today.
- The new data offers the best look yet at how tighter immigration enforcement is affecting America's demographic makeup.
📉 International migration fell in 9 out of 10 U.S. counties between 2024 and 2025 compared to the prior period, the Census Bureau says.
- Other counties stayed flat.
🗽 That drop is hitting populous areas especially hard.
- Census Bureau demographer George M. Hayward said in a statement: "The nation's largest counties ... are often international migration hubs, gaining large numbers of international migrants and losing people that move to other parts of the country via domestic migration."
- "With fewer gains from international migration, these types of counties saw their population growth diminish or even turn into loss."
🇺🇸 The big picture: The U.S. overall still grew by 0.5% between 2024-25.
- But that's down from 1% over the previous period.
Nationwide natural change (births minus deaths) held steady. International migration plummeted from around 2.8 million people to 1.3 million — about a 55% drop.
- Caveat: International migration includes both foreigners and Americans coming home from abroad, including military service members.
The other side: The fastest-growing metros overall in 2024-25 were Ocala, Fla. (+3.4%); Myrtle Beach, S.C. (+3.2%) and Spartanburg, S.C. (+2.8%).
2. 💉 COVID vaccine injuries could become official condition

Trump administration health officials are considering a plan that would make COVID-19 vaccine injuries a formal diagnosis that can be coded in medical records, Axios' Maya Goldman reports.
- Better documentation could help lay the groundwork for lawsuits against vaccine makers.
👩⚕️ CDC officials last week considered a proposal from a nonprofit representing people with COVID-19 vaccine injuries that would add a distinct code to the system doctors use to classify illnesses.
- The new code could allow providers "to identify, track and study patients who experience adverse effects specifically related to COVID vaccines," Mary Stanfill, a CDC health information specialist, said during a public meeting last week.
- Such codes are also used for insurance payouts, as well as research and statistical analysis.
3. ⚡️ Catch me up

- 🇮🇷 President Trump called on the Iranian regime today "to get serious soon" in negotiations "before it is too late." More from Barak Ravid.
- 🏛️ Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) tells Axios that she will "most likely" vote for House Democrats' resolution to constrain Trump from waging war with Iran the next time it comes up for a vote. Go deeper.
- 🏃♀️ Olympic organizers are banning transgender women from competing in the female category, while also instituting DNA-based sex testing for all female athletes. Go deeper.
- ☕️ Protein coffee and other drinks are emerging as a key part of Starbucks' turnaround, with demand peaking on Friday mornings, Axios' Kelly Tyko reports. Go deeper.
4. 📸 Pics to go: America's pastime returns

MLB's Opening Day began this afternoon, with the Pittsburgh Pirates visiting the New York Mets in Queens.
- 🪝 Hotshot Pirates pitcher Paul Skenes got the hook in the first after the Amazins' pulled ahead 5-2 on 37 pitches.
That's after the Yankees shut out the San Francisco Giants last night 7-zip in Netflix's "Opening Night" showdown. (Gift link: TV review by The Athletic's Andrew Marchand.)

⚾️ Tim Barnicle, academic and writer, waxes poetic about America's pastime on Substack: "Baseball remains our game, but it is much more than that."
- "It is a clarion call for hope, for wonder, and for possibility. A warren to protect from the winter wind. A daily American Aeneid, unfolding not verse by verse but pitch by pitch." Keep reading.

🌭 "It is the sizzle of the grill and a melting bead of ice cream running down a child's face in the hot summer sun. It is the tang of lemonade on your lips and the pop of a bubble that got too big."
- "It is the feeling of a sunburn when you sit down to dinner and the chirping of crickets on a summer night you hope never ends. It is the call of your father's voice, resonant once more, calling you in from the porch as you reply, "One more at bat!"
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