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%).

• Go deeper.

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.

Keep reading.

1. 🇮🇷 President Trump called on the Iranian regime today "to get serious soon" in negotiations "before it is too late." More from Barak Ravid.
2. 🏛️ 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.
3. 🏃‍♀️ 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.
4. ☕️ 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.

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!"

Today's schedule.