Soaring Illegal Immigration During Biden’s First Year in Office Drives US Foreign-Born Population to 46.6 Million

Unprecedented levels of illegal immigration during President Joe Biden’s first year in office has driven the United States’ foreign-born population to the highest point it has ever been, a new study has revealed.

Analysis of US census data by the Center for Immigration Studies found that there are currently 46.6 million legal and illegal foreign-born immigrants in the country – up 1.7 million from last year, and 2.2 million from 2020.

The number is the largest ever recorded in any government survey or decennial census since their introduction in 1850.

The authors also noted that the increases seen since 2020 are markedly more than the 770,000 average annual increase recorded in the decade before the pandemic.

The study further revealed that Hispanic immigrants accounted for roughly 70 percent – or 1.1 million – of the increase, suggesting that a large share of the sudden growth was spurred by illegal immigration, with the federal government and experts previously estimating that roughly 75 percent of illegal immigrants are of Hispanic descent.

It also pointed to a marked decrease of the recorded immigrants through the middle of 2020, during the last year of Trump’s presidency, after the head of state introduced a slew of policies, including Title 42, which allowed US officials to send illegal border-crossers back to Mexico, even if they originated from another country.

‘All of these factors, as well as others, significantly slowed the pace of new arrivals into the country,’ the study notes.

Immigration has rocketed since Joe Biden became president in January 2021, with many migrants flocking to the southern border hoping for softer treatment than was meted out under Donald Trump.

Biden has himself kept in place a hardline policy – Title 42 – enacted by Trump, which allows Immigration and Customs Enforcement to expel adults who cross the border illegally without children.

The analysis by the independent American organization, which has studied immigration trends in the country since its formation four decades ago, further revealed that the US’ foreign-born population now accounts for more than 14.2 percent of people in the country – the highest it’s been in 112 years.

The studies’ authors attributed the increase to lax policies implemented by the new president, sworn in a little over a year ago, that they say have allowed illegal immigrants to cross the U.S.-Mexico border in droves.

‘The large surge of illegal immigrants at the southern border caused in part by the perception, based on his campaign promises, that President Biden would curtail immigration enforcement explains at least some of the growth in the immigrant population we are seeing,’ Steven Camarota, the center’s director of research, and demographer Karen Zeigler, wrote in an abstract of the organization’s probe.

They warned the number is set to rise in the coming years.

‘If present trends continue, the immigrant share is likely to surpass the all-time highs reached in 1890 (14.8 percent) and 1910 (14.7 percent) in the next few years,’ the authors said, referring to the rush of immigrants the country saw from countries like Italy and Ireland after the Industrial Revolution.

With that said, the population of the US at those points in history were but a fraction of what it is currently tabbed at today – a whopping 329.5million – with the country only boasting roughly 62million people in 1890 and 92 million in 1910.

The study also cannot account for the current exact number of illegal immigrants, due to the fact that many do not pay taxes and avoid government detection, and thus are not accounted for in United States Census Bureau.

It is estimated that there are roughly 12million unauthorized immigrants living in the US today, though the number may be much higher, the authors said in the report, released Wednesday.

For the past year, the country has struggled with the issue of illegal immigration, as roughly 2 million would-be migrants were stopped at the US-Mexico border by American border officials. Meanwhile, millions of others likely avoided detection to enter the country illegally – now in unpresented numbers, according to the data displayed in the center’s analysis.

According to the authors, who cited numbers from the study to support their claims, Biden is to blame for the crisis, due to his dismantling of policies implemented by his predecessor, Donald Trump, that would have – and previously did, the data shows -quell the rush, including putting the kibosh on the former president’s planned border wall and stricter policies pertaining to entries and deportations.

After Trump’s crackdown on rising levels of illegal immigrations, the country saw a low of 43.8 million in August and September of 2020, which has since rebounded since Biden has taken office, increasing by 2.8 million to the newly recorded 46.6 million in January of this year.

Federal officials said the surge began the month before Biden took office, after the election, suggesting that prospective immigrants saw an opportunity to emigrate to the country due to the lax immigration policies promised by the Democrat during his campaign.

The center’s report noted, ‘The immigrant population began to grow, relative to the same month in the prior year, in December 2020 and has continued to increase every month thereafter.’

Several states have since challenged Biden’s more casual immigrant policies.

On Wednesday, Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich argued before the Supreme Court in Washington, DC, that Biden’s administration should resume previously held practices of granting immigration status to hopeful migrants able to sustain themselves in the country without government benefit programs like welfare.

Trump has also condemned Biden’s approach to the immigration issue, saying in an interview with Fox News last year that the new president is showing ‘no leadership’ with his stance on the issue, during a crisis that could ‘destroy our country.’

Illegal immigrant numbers DROP by 14% in a month to 153,941 in January as Biden uses Trump’s Title 42 order to expel HALF those who entered US illegally
The number of illegal immigrants entering the US dropped by 14 per cent in January to 153,941 – with half of those crossers expelled by Biden using a law enacted by Donald Trump.

U.S. Border Patrol officers and the Office of Field Operations registered 153,941 interdictions in January after 178,840 were reported in December 2021, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data that was presented in a Texas federal court this week.

At least 78,486 people were expelled to Mexico under the Title 42 immigration order, a Trump-era policy that the former Republican president enforced in March 2020.

The measure allows CBP to expel migrants under Centers for Disease Control and Prevention public health order that deemed them a health risk under COVID-19.