US has more immigrants than any other country in the world, study finds

Tré Goins-Phillips  May 3, 2017 6:40 pm

New citizens recite the Pledge of Allegiance during their naturalization ceremony at George Washington's Mount Vernon on Feb. 22 in Mount Vernon, Virginia. According to a new study from the Pew Research Center, the U.S. is home to more immigrants than any other country in the world. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) 

The United States is home to more immigrants than any other country in the world, a new survey revealed.

According to a report from the Pew Research Center, more than 40 million people currently living the the U.S. were born in another country. In other words, roughly one-fifth of the world’s migrant population call the U.S. home.

“The U.S. foreign-born population reached a record 43.2 million in 2015. Since 1965, when U.S. immigration laws replaced a national quota system, the number of immigrants living in the U.S. has more than quadrupled,” the study says.

Today, immigrants account for 13.4 percent of the U.S. population, which is almost three times the share (4.7 percent) in 1970.

Pew estimates that by 2065 the number of immigrants in the U.S. will have grown to more than 78 million.

Broken down by race, the analysis predicts Asians will make up roughly 38 percent of all immigrants, Hispanics will be 31 percent, whites will be 20 percent, and blacks will be 9 percent.

While most immigrants living in the U.S. are doing so legally, about a quarter, or 11 million, are in the country illegally.

All of this comes as President Donald Trump has vowed to crack down on illegal immigration. The president has twice tried to temporarily freeze immigration into the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries, as well as institute a short-term moratorium on the refugee program. But his efforts have been shot down by federal judges.

Trump also signed an executive order just days after taking office calling for the removal of people living in the U.S. illegally who “have been convicted of any criminal offense,” “have been charged with any criminal offense,” “have committed acts that constitute a chargeable criminal offense,” or “are subject to a final order of removal.”

In two memos issues in February, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly instructed his agency to hire 5,000 more Border Patrol agents and 10,000 additional Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in order to accommodate the White House’s increased focus on illegal immigration.

Kelly also called for the end of so-called “catch-and-release” policies that allow illegal immigrants to stay freely in the U.S. while they await hearings on their legal status moving forward.

“If an immigration officer determines that an arriving alien is inadmissible to the United States under [existing law], the officer shall, consistent with all applicable laws, order the alien removed from the United States without further hearing or review, unless the alien is an unaccompanied alien child,” the guidance reads.

As for where the U.S.’s immigrant population is living, Pew found that the majority are concentrated in three states: California (25 percent), Texas (11 percent), and New York (10 percent).