Legal Immigration to the US Falls Significantly Under Trump
At the end of Donald Trump’s second year in office, it is projected that legal immigration to the US will have dropped by 12%.
The tightening of the borders to both legal and illegal immigrants has affected regions across the board, but Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East have been the biggest hit–specifically Yemen, Syria, Libya, and Iran, the countries listed on Trump’s recently upheld travel ban. Those five countries are on pace for an 81% drop in US visa issuances.
On top of that, 9 out of the 10 countries that are typically rewarded with the most visas to the US will also see a significant reduction in legal immigration to the States–including Mexico, Dominican Republic, China, Philippines, India, Vietnam, Haiti, Bangladesh, Jamaica, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. The only exception being El Salvador, which looks set for a 17% increase.
Europe will see a slight increase while immigrants admitted from Africa will drop 15%.
While it could be the case that interest has declined to immigrate to America or that Trump’s rhetoric has scared potential immigrants off, it’s not extremely likely considering the huge backlog of immigrant visa requests that are always on the books in the US.
During the Obama years, immigrant visas surged by 33%, the highest number in decades.
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