New Census Bureau Estimates Indicate Huge Decline in Illegal Immigration

by Steven Camarota


The big story in the Census Bureau’s newly released 2025 Population Estimates is an enormous decline in net international migration (NIM) — the difference between the total number of people entering and leaving the country. The Bureau reports significantly fewer foreign-born people arrived, and more departed than in prior years. The decline in new arrivals reflects fewer refugees admitted and a large falloff in the number of people released at the border.

The new estimates measure the last six months of Biden’s term and the first six months of Trump’s, mid-2024 to mid-2025. The Bureau projects NIM for mid-2025 to mid-2026 will slow further due to a further large decline in foreign-born immigration (arrivals) and an increase in emigration (departures), if trends continue.

The Bureau’s new estimate of net international migration indicates that the flow of illegal immigrants into the country responds to policy choices and is not uncontrollable, as was so often asserted, including during the Biden administration. Some of Biden’s changes at the end of his term and Trump’s policies in the first part of this year fundamentally changed the level of illegal immigration.

Among the key findings of the new estimates: The Census Bureau estimates that net international migration (NIM) fell to 1.26 million from mid-2024 to mid-2025, down from 2.73 million the year before. (See table NST-EST2025-ALLDATA)
Net migration includes legal immigrants, illegal immigrants and the U.S.-born.
The Bureau estimates that if present trends continue NIM will fall to 321,000, mid-2025 to mid-2026. This is due to a projected further decline in new arrivals and another increase in emigration of the foreign-born.
Because the U.S. has relatively high fertility compared to many other developed countries, “natural increase”, which measures births minus deaths was still 519,000 annually. This represents population growth without NIM. (Table NST-EST2025-ALLDATA)
Natural increase of 519,000 represents a rebound from natural increase of only 146,000 in 2021 and 224,000 in 2022 when deaths spiked due to Covid-19. (Table NST-EST2025-ALLDATA)
When natural increase was added to NIM, total population growth reported by the Census Bureau was nearly 1.8 million from mid-2024 to mid-2025.

In a prior publication, the Center for Immigration Studies estimated a significant decline in the total foreign-born population from January to July 2025 based on the Current Population Survey. This new Census Bureau estimate of net international migration measures something related but distinct. First, unlike NIM, changes in the size of the foreign-born reflect deaths among the existing foreign-born population. Second, NIM as reported by the Census Bureau includes the arrival and departure of both the foreign-born and the U.S-born. Finally, our prior publication on the decline in the foreign-born was for the period January to July of 2025, it did not include the second half of 2024, as do these new Census Bureau estimates of NIM.




https://cis.org/Camarota/New-Census-Bureau-Estimates-Indicate-Huge-Decline-Illegal-Immigration