A
page on the White House website argues so-called "chain migration" is bad for the U.S. economy.
"There is general agreement amongst immigration experts that low-skilled migrants create a net fiscal deficit, creating more in government expenditures than they pay in taxes. According to one study, current immigration policy imposes as much as $300 billion annually in net fiscal costs on U.S. taxpayers," said one of the graphics posted Dec. 15.
Graphic posted on WhiteHouse.gov
The economic impact of immigration is widely debated, but PolitiFact decided to take a closer look at the $300 billion figure.
Trump’s team highlighted a September 2016
Washington Times story headlined: "Mass immigration costs government $296 billion a year, depresses wages." It reported on a
study from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine on the economic and fiscal consequences of immigration.
A consultant who contributed to the report told us that in 2013 the total fiscal burden -- average outlays minus average receipts multipled by 55.5 million individuals -- was $279 billion for the first generation of immigrants. But making a conclusion on that one figure is a mighty case of cherry-picking.
Economic and fiscal consequences report
The National Academies
found that first-generation immigrants (who were born outside of the United States) cost governments more money than the native-born population. The costs are largely taken on by state and local governments that educate the immigrants’ children.
But members of the second generation "are among the strongest economic and fiscal contributors in the U.S. population," the report said, with tax contributions greater than their parents and the native-born population.
In the long term, the immigrant impact is "generally positive" at the federal level but remains negative at state and local levels, varying significantly across states.
"To characterize that one number as the cost to current native-born taxpayers, is absolutely a case of cherry-picking one result out of a very detailed report," said Gretchen Donehower, an academic specialist at the University of California at Berkeley and consultant who contributed to the report.
Donehower gave us three caveats to the White House’s message:
The government runs on a deficit, so on average, taxpayers, including the native-born, benefit more than they pay in taxes. While members of the first, second, and third generations on average all cost more than they pay, we are all pushing a substantial amount of debt onto future generations — and immigrants and their descendants will also be "on the hook" for that debt.
Some costs won’t go away even if immigrants do. If all of the first-generation immigrants suddenly left the country, the government wouldn’t immediately have its expense burden reduced by $279 billion. Calculations in the study included defense costs and interest on the existing public debt, which would not go down without the 55.5 million immigrants. If those costs were excluded, the total fiscal burden for the first generation and dependents would go down to $43 billion, and the per capita burden would be more for the native-born population than for the first-generation immigrants.
The overall effect of immigration on economic growth was positive.Whatever costs immigrants might present now will be "paid back" by overall economic growth that will lead to more tax revenue on average for the government and less demand for need-based benefit programs. "The $279 billion calculation does not include any estimate of this effect and so is an upper bound on total fiscal impact," Donehower said.
The study analyzed fiscal impacts using assumptions under different scenarios, which led to varying outcomes, said Chris Mackie, a study director with the Committee on National Statistics at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
The $279 billion impact stems from the combination of worst-case assumptions, he said. Under other assumptions, the fiscal burden was $43 billion.
The point is that these numbers are estimates and depend on various factors, including immigrants’ age, education and timeframe examined.
The study also said the historical record suggests that the total net fiscal impact of immigrants across all levels of government has become more positive over time.
"The evidence does not suggest that current immigrant flows cost native-born taxpayers money over the long-run nor does it provide support for the notion that lowering immigration quotas or stepping up enforcement of existing immigration laws would generate savings to existing taxpayers,"
said a post on Econofact co-authored by Donehower and Francine Blau, an economics professor at Cornell University who chaired the panel that released the report.
The claim from the White House shows "a pretty misleading reading of the study," said Margaret Peters, an assistant professor of political science at the University of California-Los Angeles.
"While the first generation does impose fiscal costs, those costs are more than made up for at the federal level by the second generation (the children of immigrants)," Peters said. "On the state level, it is true that immigrants impose more of a burden in large part because they have children who go to school and states don't always recoup the costs of schooling."
David Dyssegaard Kallick, director of immigration research at the Fiscal Policy Institute, said, "This is just sophistry."
Since the United States has been running a deficit for years, "by definition, all Americans have a bigger net cost than contribution — first-generation immigrants, second-generation immigrants, and those of us who have been here for three or more generations," he said. "That’s a failure of tax policy, not a story about immigrants."
Our ruling
The White House claimed that "current immigration policy imposes as much as $300 billion annually in net fiscal costs on U.S. taxpayers."
A study from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine analyzed the fiscal impact of immigration under different scenarios. Under some assumptions, the fiscal burden was $279 billion, but $43 billion in other scenarios.
The report also found that U.S.-born children with at least one foreign-born parent are among the strongest economic and fiscal contributors, thanks in part to the spending by local governments on their education.
The statement is partially accurate but leaves out important details. We rate it Half True.
Published: Tuesday, January 23rd, 2018 at 11:00 a.m.
Email exchange, White House press office, Jan. 2, 2018
Email interview, David Dyssegaard Kallick, director of immigration research at the Fiscal Policy Institute, Jan. 19, 2018
Email interview, Chris Mackie, a study director with the Committee on National Statistics at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Jan. 10, 2018
Email interview, Gretchen Donehower, an academic specialist at the University of California at Berkeley, Jan. 13, 2018
Email interview, Margaret Peters, an assistant professor of political science at the University of California-Los Angeles, Jan. 11, 2018
Donald Trump
President of the United States
Says "22 to 24 people" came into the United States due to family connection with suspect in the October 2017 New York City terror attack.
in a Cabinet meeting – Tuesday, January 9, 2018
President Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that more than 20 people have migrated to the United States due to family ties to a terror attack suspect.
A man drove a truck onto a bike lane and pedestrian walkway in Manhattan on Oct. 31, killing eight people and injuring 12 others. The suspect,
Sayfullo Habibullaevic Saipov, is an Uzbek national whom Trump has singled out as a reason why "chain migration" and a visa lottery program should end.
"This man that came in — or whatever you want to call him — brought in, with him, other people … He was the point of contact — the primary point of contact for — and this is preliminarily — 23 people that came in, or potentially came in with him. And that’s not acceptable. So we want to get rid of chain migration, and we’ve wanted to do that for a long time," Trump
said Nov. 1.
Trump offered a lower number as he discussed the terror suspect
with the Wall Street Journal on Jan. 11: "So the lottery has to end, chain migration — he brought in, they say, 22 people through the chain. So we have 22 of his relatives, why?"
Two days earlier during a meeting on immigration with bipartisan lawmakers, Trump
said it was "22 to 24 people came in through him."
We wondered if Trump was right: have at least 22 people come to the United States due to familial links to Saipov?
Neither the White House nor the Department of Homeland Security provided information to substantiate Trump’s claims. A State Department spokesperson told us that visa records are confidential under immigration law, preventing comment on the details of individual visa cases.
Experts told us Trump’s figures are improbable.
Green card holders have limits on family sponsorship
That is not what happened with Saipov, who arrived in 2010.
Multiple news outletsreported that Saipov got married in the United States in 2013 to a woman who already lived here, also an Uzbek national. Their three children were all born in the United States. The family lived in Paterson, N.J.
"Unless Saipov had 22 unmarried, under-age-21 children at the time he came here, President Trump's statement that Saipov brought 22 people with him is clearly false," said Stephen H. Legomsky, an emeritus professor at the Washington University School of Law in St. Louis who served as chief counsel of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services from 2011 to 2013.
Once in the United States,
green card holders, such as Saipov, are only able to petition their spouse and unmarried children.
We have not seen any reports of 29-year-old Saipov fathering more than 20 kids before he left Uzbekistan and petitioning for them to come to the United States since his arrival.
Generally, is it possible for one green card holder to bring in 22 or more relatives?
"It may be possible, but it’s very unlikely," said Julia Gelatt, a senior policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute working with the U.S. Immigration Policy Program. "Theoretically, if someone had many foreign-born children, and those children had many children, they could sponsor one spouse, plus 21 children and grandchildren. The grandchildren would come as derivatives of their children."
But that would be far above the average rate of family sponsorship, Gelatt said.
The department did not describe Saipov as having "extended family chain migration."
Our ruling
Trump said that "22 to 24 people" came into the United States due to family connection with the suspect in the October 2017 New York City terror attack.
The Trump administration did not provide any information to support this repeated claim about Saipov.
Green card holders, such as Saipov, can only petition for a spouse and unmarried children to come to the United States. Media reports indicate that Saipov married a woman who already lived in the United States and that their three children were born in the United States.
Saipov could not have petitioned parents or siblings in his current immigration status.
Without evidence to support it, we rate Trump's claim False.
Published: Wednesday, January 24th, 2018 at 12:00 p.m.
Twitter, @realdonaldtrump
tweet, Nov. 1, 2017
Email exchange, White House press office, Jan. 18, 2018
Email exchange, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services press office, Jan. 18, 2018
Email exchange, U.S. State Department press office, Jan. 23, 2018
PolitiFact, "Is diversity visa program a 'Schumer beauty,' " as Donald Trump says?, Nov. 1, 2017
Email interview, Stephen H. Legomsky, an emeritus professor at the Washington University School of Law in St. Louis, Jan. 23, 2018
Email interview, Julia Gelatt, a senior policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute working with the U.S. Immigration Policy Program, Jan. 23, 2018
Twitter, @spoxdhs
tweet, Dec. 11, 2017
