Tag Archives: immigration

Who’s really crossing the U.S. border?

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This article is from Lawfare, and the answer is interesting.

First off, while the current administration has tried to tie Central American migrants to MS-13, government data reveals that gang members crossing irregularly are the rare exceptions. Since the Trump administration took office, the Border Patrol has detected fewer gang members crossing irregularly than during the Obama administration. In FY2017, these detections amounted to 0.075 percent of the total number of migrants (228 MS-13 members out of 303,916 total migrants). When combined with MS-13’s rival, the Barrio 18 gang, the number rises only slightly to 0.095 percent. This is far from the “infestation” of violent gang members described by the president…

The face of migration has also changed. Back in 2000, Mexican nationals made up 98 percent of the total migrants and Central Americans (referring to Honduran, Guatemalan, and Salvadoran migrants) only one percent. Today, Central Americans make up closer to 50 percent.

A declining Mexican birth rate, a stable economy, and the U.S. border buildup have all contributed to the decrease in migration from Mexico. But as Mexican irregular migration has plummeted, Central American migration has simultaneously picked up. Until 2011, Central Americans constituted less than ten percent of total U.S.-Mexico border apprehensions, but by 2012 they constituted 25 percent, and by 2014 they numbered half of all illicit border crossers. While migration from each country within the Northern Triangle (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras) has fluctuated over time, each country has sent roughly similar numbers of people in the aggregate. From FY1995 to FY2016, the U.S. Border Patrol apprehended around 500,000 citizens from each country. In other words, it’s not a coincidence that most recent news stories about migrant parents separated from their children feature families from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador.

People from Honduras and El Salvador are often fleeing urban gang violence, while those from Guatemala are often fleeing rural poverty.

 

facts and figures on illegal immigrants

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The Week has some surprising facts and figures on illegal immigrants in the U.S. Just for fun, I’ll state it in the form of a quiz:

  1. About how many illegal immigrants are there, and what percentage of the U.S. population is that?
  2. What percentage of illegal immigrants here now have been here for more than 10 years?
  3. Is the number of illegal immigrants increasing or decreasing?
  4. What percentage of illegal immigrants are Mexican?
  5. Obviously, “illegal immigrant” means they crossed the border illegally, right?
  6. What percentage work? What percentage pay taxes? What percentage are receiving public assistance?
  7. What percentage have committed criminal offenses?

Answers (and I’ll repeat the questions, because it would be annoying if I didn’t):

  1. About how many illegal immigrants are there [Answer: 11 million], and what percentage of the U.S. population is that [Answer: 3.5%]?
  2. What percentage of illegal immigrants here now have been here for more than 10 years? [Answer: 66%]
  3. Is the number of illegal immigrants increasing or decreasing? [Answer: decreasing, from a peak of about 12 million in 2007. ]
  4. What percentage of illegal immigrants are Mexican? [Answer: 50%]
  5. Obviously, “illegal immigrant” means they crossed the border illegally, right? [Wrong: about 60% did, but 40% entered legally and overstayed their visas]
  6. What percentage work? [Answer: 73%] What percentage pay taxes? [Answer: 50%] What percentage are receiving public assistance? [Answer: 0% of adults, although children who are not citizens may receive public schooling and emergency medical care]
  7. What percentage have committed criminal offenses? [Answer: 7.5%]

U.S. Muslims: Facts and Figures

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This article from The Week has some interesting facts and figures on U.S. Muslims.

The Pew Research Center estimates that 3.3 million Muslims live in the U.S., which makes Islam the nation’s third-largest faith, behind Christianity and Judaism. It’s a diverse population primarily divided among African-Americans, South Asians, and Arabs, and a well-educated one: About 40 percent of U.S. Muslims hold college degrees, as opposed to 29 percent of Americans overall. Though Muslims represent 1 percent of the population, they account for 10 percent of the nation’s physicians…

As many as 30 percent of Africans enslaved in the U.S. were Muslim. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Muslim immigrants arrived from Turkey, Syria, and Lebanon, largely settling in the Midwest; later waves came from Bosnia, Albania, and other parts of Europe. In the 1960s, the Muslim population began to swell as the government lifted immigration quotas and many African-Americans began converting to Islam. Muslim immigration surged at century’s end — 45 percent of today’s Muslim-Americans arrived after 1990; between 1994 and 2011 the number of U.S. mosques more than doubled, from 962 to 2,106…

More than 80 percent of U.S. Muslims expressed satisfaction with life in America, and 63 percent said they felt no conflict “between being a devout Muslim and living in a modern society.” About 70 percent of Muslim immigrants go on to become U.S. citizens, compared with 50 percent of other groups, and almost 6,000 Muslims serve in the U.S. armed forces. Most of the tips about radicalized Muslims in the U.S. come from the Muslim community itself, the FBI says…