Sunday Read: Undocumented immigrants from Asia grow to 1.5 million

AAPI communities' conceren about immigration continues to grow.

The number of unauthorized immigrants to the US from Asia has risen in the decade 2007 to 2017, from 1.3 million to 1.5 million, based on an analysis by the Pew Research Center.

During that same period, the number of Mexican unauthorized immigrants declined while the total from other Central America ticked up. Mexicans made up less than half of all unauthorized U.S. immigrants (47%) in 2017 for the first time, according to the Center’s estimate, compared with 57% in 2007. 

The number of unauthorized immigrants rose over the 2007-2017 decade from two birth regions: Asia and Central America. The numbers declined over the past decade from two others: South America and the combined regions of Europe and Canada. The decline was statistically significant among European-born unauthorized immigrants, but not among those from Canada.

The data released by Pew on June 12 also shows that unauthorized immigrants from Asia is led by those from India, China and the Philippines, according to Pew.

The decline in unauthorized immigrants from Mexico and rise from other parts of the world is one sign of a change in how recent arrivals to this population enter the country. A growing share of U.S. unauthorized immigrants do not cross the border illegally, but probably arrive with legal visas and overstay their required departure date. These “likely overstays” have made up a large majority of unauthorized immigrant arrivals since 2010, according to Pew Research Center analysis.

The Center’s estimate of unauthorized immigrants includes 1.5 million or more people who have temporary permission to stay in the U.S. but could be subject to deportation by changes in government policy. In 2017, they included about 320,000 people from 10 nations with Temporary Protected Status, and about 700,000 beneficiaries of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).  

A rising number of people who have applied for asylum and are awaiting a ruling. The majority of those refugees waiting to be interviewed by an understaffed and overwhelmed immigration force fall into this latter group.

As the number of unauthorized immigrants shrank by 14% from 2007 to 2017, the U.S. lawful immigrant population continued to grow. During this period, the population of lawful U.S. immigrants – citizens and noncitizens, on permanent and temporary visas – rose by almost a quarter, to 35.2 million.

Unauthorized immigrants were 23% of the 45.6 million foreign-born residents in the U.S. in 2017.

Despite the decline of unauthorized immigrants over the decade, the number of in 2017 was triple the 3.5 million in 1990.

While mainstream media continues to focus on immigrants from Mexico and Central America, the plight of immigrants from Asia, unauthorized and those who are here legally, continue to be overlooked.

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Asians make up largest group of foreign-born Americans

THE NUMBER of foreign-born people in the United States grew last year to its highest share in over a century, according to Census Bureau data published on Thursday  (Sept. 14). Compared to past decades, America's newest immigrants are most likely to come from Asia, continuing a trend first noticed earlier this decade.

Overall the number of foreign-born residents in the United States is now the highest it has been since 1910, according to recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

Demographers analyzed the census data for the years 2010 to 2017,

Researchers found that 41 percent of immigrants during those years arrived from Asia, while 39 percent came from Latin America, reports the New York Times. Though foreign-born U.S. residents as a whole are primarily Latin American—50 percent of the population, as opposed to the 31 percent who are Asian—recent data suggests that tides are shifting.

William H. Frey from the Brookings Institute, a demographer and professor at the University of Michigan’s Population Studies Center, explains the growing demographics of Asian-American communities in the U.S. in his recently published book Diversity Explosion: How New Racial Demographics Are Remaking America.

According to the data, Chinese and Indian residents make up the largest and second-largest portions of America’s Asian population, with the greatest numbers of both groups residing in New York City.

Los Angeles is home to the country’s largest Filipino, Vietnamese, and Korean communities, who make up the next biggest Asian populations in the nation. With the rise in immigrantion from Asia, however, Asian American communities have sprung up in Atlanta, Austin, and Raleigh, according to National Geographic.

PEW GRAPHIC

The increase took the number of foreign-born residents to 44.5 million in 2017, up 1.8 percent from a year earlier.

The administration has proposed new restrictions on legal immigration and wants to reduce the number of newcomers by 50%. Immigration authorities have stepped up efforts as well to detain and deport immigrants in the country illegally since Trump took office in January 2017.

The data also shows that 45% of the foreign-born come with college degrees, which contradicts the Trump administration's view of immigrants. 

Many of the immigrants from Asia work in the medical fields, often fulfilling the health care needs of Americans in underserved areas; school districts are importing teachers from the Philippines because fewer U.S. residents are becoming teachers because of the low pay; and addressing the positions in the high tech industry because not enough U.S. students are entering the science and math fields.

“We think of immigrants as being low-skilled workers from Latin America, but for recent arrivals that’s much less the case. People from Asia have overtaken people from Latin America,” said Frey.

Immigrants who entered the U.S. in the early part of the decade have fulfilled the five-year residency requirement prior to becoming citizens and becoming voters. Most of the new immigrants are registering as Democrats because of the anti-immigrant policies being proposed by the Republican-led administration.

According to a Pew Research Center report, all of the states with the highest proportions of foreign-born voters (California, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Nevada, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York) are states where Democrats are making their greatest gains. Many of these states — including California, Illinois, and New Jersey — used to be fairly competitive but are now overwhelmingly blue. Others – such as Florida and Nevada — once leaned Republican but are now fairly competitive.

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