According to a major report from the Center for Immigration Studies, the total foreign-born population of America has reached nearly 48 million. Astonishingly, that number (47.861 million), the largest ever recorded, has increased by a whopping 2.9 million in only the 21 months since the start of the Biden administration. It includes all legal and illegal residents born elsewhere. It does not include an additional 17.2 million children under the age of 18 who have at least one foreign-born parent. Those children, because of birthright citizenship, are automatically considered citizens.
Traditionally, Mexican nationals have contributed the largest share of America’s foreign born. However, in the period studied, January 2021 through September 2022, the number of Mexican nationals actually dropped (from 11,966,000 to 11,859,000) while the total from the rest of Latin America and the Caribbean grew–from 11,662,000 to 13,383,000, or 15 percent. Likewise, the total numbers of Sub-Sahara Africans grew by 15 percent, followed by increases from India, Europe, Asia, etc.
To add some perspective, this estimated number of the foreign born–47.861 million–constitutes a huge nation within a nation whose population (according to Wikipedia) exceeds that of all but 28 of the world’s 200+ countries. It is, for example, larger than the population of Spain (47,432,805) and Argentina (47,327,407) and exceeds that of Canada (38,987,725) by 10 million. It now makes up 14.6 percent of our total population, the highest percentage in over a century, and by the end of Biden’s term is on target to reach 51.7 million, or 15.5 percent. That increase in the nation-within-a-nation would overtake the current populations of both Colombia (51,049,498) and South Korea (51,638,809).
CIS concludes their report with these sobering words:
The country is headed into uncharted territory in terms of the foreign-born share of the population. Immigration is sometimes seen as like the weather — something outside the control of public policy. In fact, it must be understood that the level of legal immigration as well as policies and resources directed at controlling illegal immigration all represent policy choices. The dramatic growth in the foreign-born population in the last 21 months is the direct result of those choices. The key question that the public and policy-makers need to answer is whether they are good choices.
For more, see CIS.org.