PHOTO ESSAY: A small town on Cincinnati's outskirts is among those transformed by immigration surge

An old building in Lockland, Ohio, bustles every Friday afternoon, the sound of hammering old bicycle tires mixing with laughter and conversation that switches from English to the West African language Pular.

The shop, called Bikes and Stuff, offers free bikes to anyone willing to help refurbish one, and it has become the center of life for the West African community here.

Three years ago, thousands of migrants, most of them from Mauritania, arrived in this small town on the outskirts of Cincinnati — so suddenly that it seemed to some it happened overnight.

They arrived as people from more countries than ever before entered the U.S. through the southern border, an unprecedented surge of 4.7 million border crossings from October 2018 to July 2025, according to government data exclusively obtained and analyzed by The Associated Press. It marked a broader trend of migrants from more than 150 countries turning up at the border during that time, a sharp departure from previous years when nearly all were from Mexico or Central America.

These migrants are asking the United States to grant them asylum. Most fled their country because, they say, they were persecuted for opposing the authoritarian government.

Samba Diallo, like most of these migrants, arrived with nothing but the clothes on his back. They crammed into apartments and relied on a local food bank. But most don’t visit the food pantry anymore. In the years since they arrived, most have gotten work permits and jobs, they’ve bought cars, settled into apartments, and built a community here — including some local Americans who help them navigate the U.S. immigration bureaucracy.

Diallo works 10 hours a day, six days a week, at a meatpacking plant, and saved up his money to buy a car.

Khalidou Sy, another man who arrived from Mauritania at the same time, was able to buy a house on a leafy street.

Vincent Wilson, who runs Bikes and Stuff, now routinely goes with them to their check-ins with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. He holds their car keys, in case they are detained.

This is a documentary photo story curated by AP photo editors.

Vincent Wilson, left, walks with Samba Diallo, a Mauritanian immigrant back to Diallo's car after his regular appointment at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Cincinnati, Monday, Sept. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Samba Diallo, a Mauritanian immigrant, pauses for a cigarette at a convenience store and gas station after his regular appointment at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Cincinnati, Monday, Sept. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Vincent Wilson stands at left as Samba Diallo, a Mauritanian immigrant, is called to enter for his regular appointment at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Cincinnati, Monday, Sept. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

A photo of Samba Diallo's wife hangs from the inside of his car as he's driven home by Vincent Wilson, left, following an Immigration and Customs Enforcement appointment in Cincinnati, Monday, Sept. 14, 2026. Diallo posts the picture of his wife, who still lives in their native Mauritania, on the inside of his windshield to see her whenever he drives. (AP Photo Carolyn Kaster)

Khalidou Sy, a Mauritanian immigrant, carries his young daughter in the backyard of the family's home in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Khalidou Sy, a Mauritanian immigrant, talks in the backyard of his family's home in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. Sy feels like he’s part of a great American tradition, the “melting pot,” he said, like the Irish and Italians before him. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Khalidou Sy, a Mauritanian immigrant, sits with his children in the family's home in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. Sy, a well-known hip-hop artist back home, had been jailed for his music critical of the country's repressive government. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Harounat Sarre, a Mauritanian immigrant, wipes away sweat after unpacking groceries from a food pantry into the refrigerator of his shared apartment in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Harounat Sarre, a Mauritanian immigrant, rearranges his groceries in the parking lot of Valley Interfaith Community Resource Center as he walks to his shared apartment in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Harounat Sarre, a Mauritanian immigrant, opens a cooler as he gets groceries from Valley Interfaith Community Resource Center in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Yun Gao of China practices tai chi as she waits to receive food at Valley Interfaith Community Resource Center in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Mauritanian client Allasan Darko looks through donated clothing at Valley Interfaith Community Resource Center in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Wearing a "USA MY FLAG MY COUNTRY" T-shirt, a client walks into the Valley Interfaith Community Resource Center in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Mohamed, a Senegalese immigrant, pauses as he walks through the parking lot of Touba Tedoungal African Restaurant, Friday, July 31, 2026, in Lockland, Ohio, which has for decades been home to a small population of West Africans. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Halimata Ndiaye pauses on the new purple bike she just received from Bikes and Stuff in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 10, 2026. The shop offers free bikes to anyone willing to help refurbish one and has become the center of life for the West African community here. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Vincent Wilson, left, who takes in donated, broken bikes and offers them up in the community to anyone who helps fix them up, repairs a bike with the help a seven-year-old boy at Bikes and Stuff in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Vincent Wilson, who takes in donated, broken bikes and offers them up to the community for anyone who helps fix them up, looks up as he fixes a bike in front of Bikes and Stuff in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

An American flag decorates Samba Diallo's bedroom in his shared apartment in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 17, 2026. Lockland had for decades been home to a small population of West Africans who'd come to Ohio in the 1990s. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Samba Diallo, a Mauritanian immigrant, makes traditional green tea on the living room floor of his shared apartment in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Samba Diallo displays his daraa, a loose-fitting traditional robe worn by men in Mauritania, as he stands in the bedroom of his shared apartment in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 17, 2026. Diallo, like many Mauritanians, spent weeks making his way through a half-dozen countries on buses, on foot, through the jungle and across rivers, until he finally walked across the U.S. southern border and asked for asylum. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Samba Diallo, a Mauritanian immigrant, tries on a work safety helmet in a bedroom of his shared apartment in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 17, 2026. Diallo, like many from Mauritania, had fled a country where he was persecuted for opposing the country’s repressive government. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Samba Diallo, right, wears his daraa, a traditional robe worn in his homeland, Mauritania, after eating a communal meal of lamb and bread on the floor of his apartment with his roommate, Alassane Sow, in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 17, 2026. Diallo is part of an unprecedented migration surge, and an Associated Press analysis of exclusive data shows they turned some of the unlikeliest of places, like Lockland, into new American melting pots. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

An unprecedented surge in border crossings over the past decade reshaped America: Millions of people from more than 150 countries arrived, bringing the U.S. immigrant population to its highest levels ever.

Now, data obtained exclusively by The Associated Press paints a picture of who these migrants are, where they went, and what happened after the border.

Some went to cities that have long been magnets for immigrants — New York, Miami — but increasingly, others found their way to smaller cities with less developed immigrant footholds. Blocks, neighborhoods and entire cities were remade in places like Elkhart, Indiana; Knoxville, Tennessee; and Dodge City, Kansas.

And while the vast majority of migrants traditionally were from Mexico, this surge saw people from an astonishing number and diversity of countries: India, Ecuador, Ghana.

Via a Freedom of Information Act request, AP obtained federal records on the self-reported destinations of 4.5 million migrants released in the United States after crossing the Mexican border — both legally and illegally — between October 2018 and July 2025.

Migrants must provide U.S. Customs and Border Protection with a street address. AP obtained their destination ZIP codes, citizenship by country, ages, genders, and the dates and border regions where they encountered authorities.

Some probably never arrived at the addresses they gave. Authorities lacked resources to check, though migrants must report truthfully to pursue their cases in court and get work permits. Some have moved elsewhere in the United States or left the countr y, voluntarily or involuntarily. But many have stayed put.

Data on their initial destinations after the southern border provides both a sweeping and an unusually granular look at how the immigration surge — one that peaked during President Joe Biden's administration and was a major reason voters returned his predecessor, Donald Trump, to the White House — is playing out today.

Here are some key takeaways from the data.

The Border Patrol encountered migrants from 174 countries in one year alone, a sharp departure from earlier periods when they were nearly all Mexican and Central American. The growth of social media and new migration routes was key in bringing people from around the world. Cincinnati, for example, saw a large number of arrivals from West Africa, Uzbekistan and India.

Some cities — ones that for generations have had robust international communities — were further diversified by the range of countries from which people arrived.

New York City’s Queens borough registered at least 25 nationalities with significant arrivals, including five countries that each sent more than 7,000 people: Ecuador, China, Colombia, Venezuela and India.

Philadelphia had 11 nationalities with at least 1,000 new arrivals, led by Brazil, Haiti and the Dominican Republic but also including Russia and Venezuela. The city’s metro area also saw more than 1,000 migrants from Georgia.

While Florida was the most popular state overall, Latin American immigrants increasingly looked elsewhere for more promising job prospects and better quality of life. Many turned to places with small but established communities of immigrants from their homelands.

For Cubans, nine of the top 10 destination ZIP codes were in Florida, but people of the Caribbean nation also flocked to Louisville, Kentucky; Grand Island, Nebraska; and Odessa, Texas. Colombians went to the Denver suburb of Aurora. Paterson, New Jersey, was the top pick among Peruvians. Some Venezuelans headed to the growing suburbs south of Salt Lake City; others to pockets of Atlanta, Chicago and Denver.

Nearly six of every 10 migrants released at the border were women and children, a dramatic shift from a few years earlier when migrants were predominantly men.

The change is visible in many places and across nationalities, but some stand out. Tulsa, Oklahoma, attracted Mexican women and children. Ecuadorian women and children went to Spring Valley, New York. Guatemalan women were drawn to Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Chinese migrants, who trekked by hundreds nightly in California's mountainous border with Mexico, largely gravitated to two places: New York City, especially the Queens and Brooklyn boroughs, and a cluster of neighborhoods in the Los Angeles area.

Immigration arrests have hit some areas that ranked among the most popular destinations for migrants in recent years, including Miami and New York. Others that saw a large migrant influx have gotten less attention from authorities, including California’s Silicon Valley; Madison, Wisconsin; and Stamford, Connecticut.

Harounat Sarre, a Mauritanian immigrant, pauses in the parking lot of Touba Tedoungal African restaurant in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Vincent Wilson, left, who takes in donated, broken bikes and offers them up to the community for anyone who helps fix them up, repairs a bike with the help of a seven-year-old boy at Bikes and Stuff in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Venezuelans gather outside a food truck on Wednesday, July 15, 2026, in Midvale, Utah. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)

Moussa Sow, a Mauritanian immigrant, stands at the parking lot of Touba Tedoungal African restaurant in Lockland, Ohio, Friday, July 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

FILE - A group of people, including many from China, walk along the wall after crossing the border with Mexico to seek asylum, Oct. 24, 2023, near Jacumba, Calif. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull, File)