If you are curious about the areas in the United States with the most illegal immigrants, you will definitely be interested in the 25 cities with most illegal immigrants in America. The issue of illegal immigration has reached a fever point ever since Donald Trump made it a key point in his campaign for the presidency of the country, and now that he has been elected and is looking to make good on his promises, the debate is still raging strongly.
While many thought that Trump’s promise to build a wall at the Mexico border was just hyperbole, an attempt to rouse the people in his support, his subsequent emphasis on carrying out this promise shows that life for illegal immigrants is going to become much harder. Many people wonder why people move illegally to the US, risking everything. The answer is that they are looking for a better life, which includes job security, and the truth is, they do have better chances of finding work in America, even if they are undocumented, with the most common industries for illegal immigrants being agriculture, domestic services, and construction as well.
Now you may not know this, but the United States has many sanctuary cities. So what exactly is a sanctuary city? Well, cities like San Francisco and New York have tens of thousands of illegal immigrants who have made a life for themselves in the country and actually contribute to the economy instead of draining it. Therefore, the cities have decided to not cooperate completely with federal law enforcement agencies when they send requests for detaining or pursuing undocumented or illegal immigrants. However, Trump has now stated that the cities which refuse to cooperate with federal law enforcement will have to deal with budget cuts to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, a move which has seen vociferous opposition from the mayors of the sanctuary cities. If you want an idea of the states which host the most illegal immigrants, you might want to head on over to 15 States With the Most Illegal Immigrants Per Capita.
But how many illegal immigrants are there exactly? According to PEW Research, there are around 11 million undocumented immigrants scattered throughout the country. So which cities hold the most immigrants? To answer this question, we once again referred to PEW. However, we did not just consider the city or metropolitan areas with the most illegal immigrants, as there is little doubt that the largest sanctuary cities such as New York would have the highest such populations. We also considered the percentage of the total population that is made up of illegal immigrants to get a fairer idea of which are the cities with most illegal immigrants in America.
25. Yakima, WA
Total number of illegal immigrants: 25,000
Percentage of total population comprising of illegal immigrants: 9.9%
Insider Monkey score: 2.5
The percentage of the total population comprising of illegal immigrants has been a source of concern to Yakima’s residents, with awareness being spread about illegal aliens in the area.