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The numbers behind Biden’s immigration reforms

by Jack Graham | @jacktgraham | Thomson Reuters Foundation
Wednesday, 3 February 2021 10:00 GMT

DACA recipient Luis Zuluaga, who immigrated to the United States from Colombia when he was 3-years-old, is pictured outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, U.S. June 18, 2020. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

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Statistics show how millions of immigrants could be affected by President Biden's reforms, both inside and outside the United States

Feb 2 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – U.S. President Joe Biden signed several executive orders to reform the nation’s immigration system on Tuesday, as part of plans to reverse his predecessor President Donald Trump’s hard-line policies.

Biden announced the creation of a major review of asylum processing at the U.S.-Mexico border and established a task force aiming to reunite migrant families separated there under the Trump administration.

The new president is also proposing an immigration bill to create a pathway to citizenship for undocumented migrants and offer permanent protection for young migrants.

This is known as the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, known as “Dreamers”, who were brought to the country illegally as children.

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As Biden unveils more of his plans, here are the numbers behind immigration to the United States:

  • There were a record 44.8 million foreign-born people living in the United States in 2018, accounting for approximately 7% of the population.
  • Mexico is the most common origin country, numbering around one in four immigrants living in the United States. The next largest origin groups were China and India, each making up around 6% of the immigrant population.
  • Approximately 1 million people became lawful permanent residents, better-known as green card recipients, in 2019.
  • It is difficult to determine the number of illegal immigrants in the United States, but estimates range between 5 million and 12 million people, or 3.2% to 3.6% of the overall population.
  • Following family separation policies at the U.S.-Mexico border under the Trump administration, more than 600 children remain separated from their parents, according to a court filing in January.
  • As of June 2020, there were 645,610 DACA recipients in the United States, meaning those who arrived illegally as children and are given the right to work and temporary protection against deportation. The program was terminated by President Trump in 2017 but courts have since protected those who already had status.
  • Approximately three-quarters of U.S. adults support granting permanent legal status for DACA recipients and other young people who came to the United States illegally as children.
  • The percentage of asylum claims denied by immigration judges climbed to a high of 71.6% in 2020, the last year of President Trump’s administration, compared to 54.6% under his predecessor President Obama’s final year in 2016.
  • In October 2020, President Trump set the refugee cap to 15,000 people in fiscal year 2021, which dictates how many refugees can be admitted to the United States annually. The new President Biden aims to increase the ceiling to 125,000 people.

 

 

Sources: Pew Research Center, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Brookings Institute, Migration Policy Institute (MPI), TRAC at Syracuse University, U.S. Department of Homeland Security

This article was updated on Wednesday, Feb 3, 2021, at 10:00GMT following Biden's signing of the orders on Feb 2.

(Reporting by Jack Graham in Toronto, Editing by Tom Finn. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers the lives of people around the world who struggle to live freely or fairly)

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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