New statistics show that the United States has become the world’s magnet for migrants.
The figures provided by a Senate subcommittee show that the U.S. has six times as many immigrants as all of Latin America, even though the U.S. has half the population size of Latin America. That breaks down to 7.8 million in 21 Latin nations to 45.8 million in the U.S.
The result is that the U.S. also provides more benefits and welfare to migrants that any other nation, according the Senate subcommittee on immigration and the national interest, chaired by Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions.
“The United States resettles the largest number of migrants in the world, and provides more funding and benefits than any other country in the world and any other region in the world. These are the facts,” said the subcommittee.
“The U.S. contains about 4.5 percent of global population but hosts about 20 percent of the world’s global migrants. As a matter of comparison, Latin America contains nearly twice as much of the world’s population – more than 8.5 percent – but houses only about 3.35 percent of the world’s migrants. While the United States takes in one-fifth of global migrants, no other nation on earth has taken in more than one-twentieth,” it added.
The stunning statistics come as the country is resettling and housing thousands more migrants from Latin America who arrived this year and considering accepting thousands of Syrian refugees.
The subcommittee said that immigrants from the Middle East haven’t been an issue in the past, but that is rapidly changing.
“About 1 in 40 of all migrants living in the U.S. today are from the Middle East or North Africa; however, that population has been rapidly growing. More than 1 in 10 of the annual permanent migrants resettled in the U.S. is a Muslim migrant. By contrast, only about 1 in 300 of all migrants living in Mexico today are from the Middle East or North Africa. (About 1 in 7 migrants in Mexico hail from other Latin American countries, and about 7 in 10 migrants in Mexico are from Canada or the United States),” said the subcommittee fact sheet.
“To provide further perspective: in 2010 there were 3,166 migrants from the Middle East living in Mexico; between 2001 and today, the United States has issued green cards to approximately 900,000 migrants from the Middle East and 1.5 million to migrants from Muslim countries. Because it’s only a ten-year figure for the U.S., that means the U.S. has permanently resettled well more than 300 times as many Middle Eastern migrants as Mexico, for example,” it added.
Country by country breakdown:
— U.S. Total Population: 320,050,090 / Migrant Population: 48,785,090
— Latin America. Total Population: 603,855,084 / Migrant Population: 7,754,084
— Mexico: 1,103,460 migrants, Belize .5 million, Costa Rica .4 million, El Salvador .04 million, Guatemala .07 million, Honduras .02 million, Nicaragua .04 million, Panama .15 million.
— South America: 4,771,743 migrants– Argentina 1.8 million migrants, Bolivia .15 million, Brazil .6 million, Chile .4 million, Columbia .12 million, Ecuador .4 million, Paraguay .1 million, Peru .1 million, Uruguay .07 million, Venezuela 1.2 million migrants.
— The Caribbean: 613,432 migrants– Cuba .02 million migrants, Dominican Republic .4 million, Haiti .04 million, Puerto Rico .3 million immigrants.
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected].
