Border Boom: U.S. 2022 Population Growth Almost Entirely Driven by Immigration

AP Photo/Christian Chavez

International migration, including mass illegal migration, largely drove America’s population growth in 2022. I guess that after encouraging Americans to contracept and abort their progeny out of existence to the extent that the United States faces a dangerous population collapse, the radical left “fixed” the problem by allowing anyone and everyone to pour across the southern U.S. border. What was that old phrase about two wrongs not making a right?

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“The U.S. population grew by 1.2 million people this year, with growth largely driven by international migration, and the nation now has 333.2 million residents,” said the Associated Press (AP), via the Corvallis Gazette-Times. The statistics come from the U.S. Census Bureau. With the looming end of Trump-era border restrictions, the already record numbers of illegal migrants is likely to become an “avalanche.” AP explained:

“Net international migration — the number of people moving into the U.S. minus the number of people leaving — was more than 1 million residents from 2021 to 2022. That represented a growth rate of 168% over the previous year’s 376,029 international migrants, with every state gaining residents from abroad, according to the 2022 population estimates.”

One of the problems with illegal migration (which is almost certainly the majority of the population gain, based on the numbers of illegal migrants) is that it is difficult to prevent criminals from entering the United States. Border Patrol data for Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 showed a 600% spike in illegal “‘special interest migrants’ flagged as potential national security risks,” or 25,627 individuals. And in September, Border Patrol Council VP Art del Cueto said on Steve Bannon’s War Room that the criminal cartels have so much control on the border, even young teen migrants are working for them. In Fiscal Year 2022, illegal migrant crossings exceeded 2.76 million.

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The new statistics also show that leftism is causing mass migration of a different kind, since “the Northeast lost almost 219,000 people in a trend largely driven by domestic residents moving out of New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts, as well as deaths outpacing births in Pennsylvania.” Crime-ridden Chicago also seems to be inspiring some population shift: “The Midwest also lost almost 49,000 residents, driven in part by people moving out of Illinois and deaths outpacing births in Ohio.”

Related: Newsom Humiliated as California’s Migration Exodus Is Worst in Nation

Besides New York, California had the biggest annual population decline, losing a net of over 113,000 residents with its loss of 343,000 domestic residents, contributing to a much lower population increase overall in the West. California did gain more “international” residents than any other state, with Florida a close second. The West would have lost residents overall had it not been for migration and an increase in births, as leftist Washington, Oregon, and California are all losing domestic residents. Some states previously considered cheaper alternatives to California are no longer as affordable as they used to be, either. Unsurprisingly, the only area that saw a big uptick in residents was the South, particularly Texas and Florida, with Texas becoming the second state (besides California) to pass 30 million residents. Texas and Florida each gained over 400,000 residents. Florida did have 40,000 more deaths than births in 2022, however.

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The one piece of good news is that 2022 was “the first year-over-year increase in total births since 2007.”

AP said, “This year’s U.S. annual growth rate of 0.4% was a rebound of sorts from the 0.1% growth rate during the worst of the pandemic from 2020 to 2021, which was the lowest since the nation’s founding.” But is that really a positive if most of the growth comes from unvetted illegal migrants?

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