The influx of migrants entering the US in 2024 led to the largest population increase in 23 years, with the country's population exceeding 340 million, according to a Thursday report from the US Census Bureau.
Between 2023 and 2024, the US population grew by about 1%, the highest increase since 2001. In contrast, a growth rate of 0.2% in 2021 is was a record low at the height of the pandemic restrictions on travel to the US, annual population estimates. show.
This year, immigration has increased by about 2.8 million people, in part because of a new counting system that adds people who were admitted on humanitarian grounds.
International migration, which the Census Bureau says refers to any change in residence across U.S. borders, was an important part of the change driving the growth of the residential population.
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This photo shows migrants on the southern border crossing into Arizona. (US Border Patrol)
Total international migration accounted for 84% of the increase of 3.3 million people last year.
The increase reflects increasing international migration activity, with a net increase of 1.7 million in 2022 and 2.3 million in 2023.
“The improved integration of federal data sources on immigration has improved our forecasting process,” said Christine Hartley, the department's assistant chief for Estimates and Projections. “With this update, we can better understand how the recent increase in international migration affects the country's overall growth.”
Last year, births exceeded the number of deaths in the U.S. by nearly 519,000, an increase from the historic low of 146,000 in 2021, but still below record levels. decades ago.
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A Haitian immigrant is allowed to enjoy personal parole as he boards a bus transporting immigrants to the US at the Senda de Vida shelter Aug. 30, 2022, Reynosa, Mexico. (Michael Nigro/Getty Images)
The US Census Bureau did not respond to Fox News Digital's request for comment on the report.
Along with immigration statistics, the report showed that the South was the fastest growing region in the US by 2024, adding 1.8 million people, more population than all other regions combined.
Texas saw the largest increase with 562,941 new residents, followed by Florida, which gained 467,347 new residents.
Washington, DC, had the fastest growth rate in the country at 2.2%.
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Migrants wait in line to enter a shelter set up by authorities for migrants as migrants wait for an appointment with US Customs and Border Protection in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, May 23, 2023. (Christian Torres Chavez/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
Other states – Mississippi, Vermont and West Virginia – lost population in 2024, albeit by a small amount from 127 to 516 people.
Included in this year's international migration estimates are the group of people who entered the US through The Biden administration personal parole, which has been strongly criticized by Republicans.
The Migration Policy Institute in Washington, DC, reported last week that more than 5.8 million people received various citizenship policies from 2021 to 2024.
But capturing the number of new immigrants is a difficult part of US population estimates.
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The Bureau's annual estimate of how many immigrants entered the United States in the 2020s was much lower than the numbers reported by other government agencies, such as the Congressional Budget Office. The Census Bureau estimated that 1.1 million immigrants entered the United States in 2023, while the Congressional Budget Office estimate was 3.3 million people.
In the updated version, the number of immigrants last year has been recalculated by the Census Bureau to about 2.3 million people, or an additional 1.1 million people.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.