By Jack Phillips
Contributing Writer
The foreign-born population in the United States declined by nearly 1.5 million between January and June 2025, according to an analysis of census data by the Pew Research Center released on Thursday.
The figure includes both illegal immigrants and residents lawfully residing in the country. In January, there were 53.3 million immigrants in the United States. By June, that number had fallen to 51.9 million, the research found.
Underscoring its findings, Pew noted that it’s the “first decline since the 1960s” in the U.S. immigrant population.
Pew found that 15.4% of all U.S residents were foreign-born, down from a historic high of 15.8%. Immigrants made up 19% of the U.S. labor force, down from 20% in January, Pew said.
Pew noted that an “unprecedented number of immigrants,” or about 11 million people, came to the United States between 2020 and 2025. In 2023, more than 3 million people arrived, the largest annual total recorded in U.S. history, according to Pew’s analysis.
About 20% of newly arrived immigrants came from South America between 2021 and 2023, up from 13% between 2015 and 2019, according to the Pew Research Center.
Roughly 12% of new foreign-born arrivals during the same period came from Europe or Canada, an increase from 9% in the earlier period, the analysis found.
“Mexico was the largest origin country for immigrants who arrived between 2021 and 2023,” Pew said, adding that 11% of people who came to the United States in the 2021-2023 period came from Mexico.
India was second with 8%, Venezuela third with 7%, Cuba fourth with 6%, and Colombia fifth with 5%, according to Pew.
“Throughout this period, unauthorized immigrants accounted for most new immigrant arrivals, with many coming from Central and South America,” the analysis said.
Since taking office in January, the Trump administration has issued dozens of executive orders and other directives targeting immigration and the border and enforcing laws to remove illegal immigrants. During his 2024 campaign, President Donald Trump vowed to carry out record numbers of deportations.
Top White House official Stephen Miller, an architect of Trump’s immigration agenda, said in an interview in May that he had a quota for at least 3,000 arrests per day and told Immigration and Customs Enforcement leadership they should target anyone without legal status.
The Pew findings come as a federal appeals court on Wednesday cleared the way for the administration to end temporary deportation protections and cancel work permits for more than 60,000 immigrants from Central America and Nepal.
The ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit allows the government to end temporary protected status for immigrants from Nicaragua, Honduras and Nepal while a court challenge to that policy plays out.
The order immediately ends protections for Nepalis, which expired on Aug. 5. Protections for Hondurans and Nicaraguans will expire on Sept. 8.
The Supreme Court in May allowed the Trump administration to proceed with terminating temporary protected status for about 350,000 Venezuelans, paving the way for Trump to terminate it for other nations.
Reuters contributed to this report.
