New Report Underlines Link between Immigration and Unsustainable Population Growth

For Americans concerned about rapid, unsustainable population growth, a newly released Pew Research Center report confirms that immigration has been its primary driver. The Pew study supplements its earlier findings about immigration’s effect on population surges.

President Johnson signs Immigration Act; unsustainable population growth ensues.

Pew provided extensive details, some of which may surprise those who aren’t actively engrossed in the daily developments related to population and immigration. Among the key takeaways:

• The United States has more immigrants than any nation in the world. In 2015, the foreign-born population hit 43.2 million, more than four-times the total in 1965, the year that President Johnson signed the Immigration and Nationality Act. 

• California has received more immigrants than any other state, about 10.7 million, one in four among all residents, about twice the national state average. California has six of the 20 cities with the largest immigrant populations: Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, Sacramento, San Jose and Riverside. 

• In 2015, India surpassed Mexico as the largest sending country, with China not far behind – 110,000, 109,000 and 90,000, respectively. The Asian influx and Hispanic decline continues a pattern first seen in 2010. Pew projects that by 2055, Asians will be the U.S.’s largest immigrant group.

The report is chock-full with statistics about immigrants’ legal status, education, employment and English language skills. But the most telling fact was included in the final paragraph. About half of Americans want immigration reduced, versus 15 percent who want it increased.

Yet U.S. immigration, on autopilot with about one million legal immigrants admitted annually along with of tens of thousands of temporary visa holders, runs counter to people’s preference for less.

CAPS urges saving some of America for tomorrow, an impossible goal unless immigration is dramatically lowered. Watch the CAPS mini-documentary “Then, Now” here to see how unchecked population growth has adversely affected California.

Then, go to the CAPS Action Alert page here to tell your Senator to support the RAISE Act that would gradually reduce immigration 50 percent from today’s more than one million annually to 540,000.