IMMIGRATIONImmigration Drives Nation’s Population Growth
A recent immigration surge brought newcomers to every state this year, helping to offset a continued drop in U.S. births while contributing to a national upswing of about 3.3 million new residents. Texas, Florida make up nearly a third of the nation’s population increase.
A recent immigration surge brought newcomers to every state this year, helping to offset a continued drop in U.S. births while contributing to a national upswing of about 3.3 million new residents, according to new U.S. Census Bureau estimates.
Texas and Florida continued to dominate state population growth, together adding more than 1 million people from mid-2023 to mid-2024 and making up almost a third of the nation’s population increase. The state numbers include births, deaths, immigrants and residents moving from other states.
Nationally, this year’s population growth was up from the 2.8 million increase in 2023 and the 1.9 million boost in 2022, according to state population estimates released Thursday.
The population jump — the largest single-year increase since 2001 — was buoyed by a 21% increase in net immigration.
Immigration has become a more significant factor in population changes, making up all or almost all the growth for 18 states in every part of the country this year, according to an analysis of the data by William Frey, a demographer for the Brookings Institution, a left-leaning think tank.
“This points up the importance of immigration, not just to a couple of big states but to a broad swath of our country,” Frey said. “It’s going to be very welcome in a lot of places that would not be gaining many people or [would be] losing people because of lower fertility and higher deaths.”
Immigration grew in every state, ranging from an increase of about 69,000 people in Florida and California and 57,000 in Texas, down to a few hundred in Montana and Wyoming. The growth in the immigrant population ranged from 19% in Alaska to 36% in Montana.
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This points up the importance of immigration, not just to a couple of big states but to a broad swath of our country.
– William Frey, demographer at the Brookings Institution
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California and Illinois were among states that had lost residents earlier in the decade, and their growth over the past year could help both stem expected losses in congressional representation after the next nationwide census in 2030.
If the growth continues, it would trim California’s loss to three seats in the U.S. House of Representatives instead of four, and Illinois could lose one seat instead of two, said Kimball Brace, a Virginia-based redistricting expert.
Florida, where growth has slowed slightly, could gain one fewer congressional seat than predicted — three instead of four, he said.
