15 States with the Highest Share of Immigrants in Their Population

A sharp rise in the number of immigrants living in the U.S. in recent decades serves as a backdrop for the debate in Congress over the nation’s immigration policies. In 1990, the U.S. had 19.8 million immigrants. That number rose to a record 40.7 million immigrants in 2012, among them 11.7 million unauthorized immigrants.

Over this period, the number of immigrants in the U.S. increased more than five times as much as the U.S.-born population (106.1% versus 19.3%), according to a Pew Research Center analysis of Census Bureau data. As a result, from 1990 to 2012, the share of immigrants in the entire U.S. increased from 7.9% in 1990 to 13.0% in 2012.

Today there are four states in which about one-in-five or more people are foreign born–California, New York, New Jersey and Florida. By contrast, in 1990, California was the only state to have more than a fifth of its population born outside the U.S.

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