Immigration
According to the Pew Research Center, the US has more immigrants than any other country. Just over 46 million people (2023) living in the US were born outside the USA. This represents 13.9% of the total US population. In 2022, just over 2.5 million people migrated to the USA, excluding tourists and undocumented migrants.
Most of the people who migrate to the USA do so legally. Estimates from the Pew Research Centre suggest 77% of immigrants enter the US legally with the remainder (23%) illegally. These people are classed as undocumented migrants.
Of those people who enter the US legally, most come for work, as students or to be with their families.
Many undocumented migrants cross into the US over the US-Mexico border. In 2023, the number of people caught attempting to cross into the USA reached nearly 2.5 million. Texas alone had 300,000 people enter illegally in December 2023. Illegal immigration is becoming an increasing concern to Americans. In a poll by the Pew Center published in June 2023, 47% of Americans considered illegal immigration a very big problem with a further 26% stating it was a moderately big problem.
Many immigrants who live in the USA come from Mexico (10.7 million) and other central and south American countries such as El Salvador (1.4 million) and Guatemala (1.1 million). There are also large numbers of people from India (2.7 million) and east Asian countries such as China (2.3 million), the Philippines (1.9 million) and Vietnam (1.34 million). Altogether, 52% of immigrants have arrived in the USA from the Americas, 31% from Asia and 11% of immigrants have arrived from European countries.
Opinions on immigration
Opinion polls show Americans are deeply divided over the issue of immigration. Attitudes have been hardening against further large-scale legal immigration and the US government has spent billions of dollars on tightening border security.
A key pledge during Donald Trump's 2016 presidential election campaign was to build a 1,900 mile wall along the US border with Mexico, in a bid to stem illegal immigration and protect America's borders. Since then, hundreds of miles of fencing, costing billions of dollars, have been built to try to prevent illegal immigration.
When Biden ran for the presidency in 2020, he opposed the idea of a wall on the US-Mexica border but the building work continues today as many wall-building/fencing contracts were signed by President Trump to run for many years into the future, after he left office in 2020.
In 2023, the Governor of the state of Texas, Greg Abbott, was involved in a row with the federal government over the state鈥檚 use of razor wire on the Mexican border. Republican Governor Abbot believes that not enough is being done by the Democrat Biden administration to stop illegal immigration. President Biden on the other hand, argues that the razor wire is a danger to federal US Border Patrol agents and migrants and has ordered US Border Patrol officers to cut it away, with the US Supreme Court backing President Biden on this issue.
In the 2024 US presidential election, illegal immigration is likely to be a key issue for voters.