The CDC/C.B.O. Comparison of Census and Census-Based Data for the U.S. Post-World Wide Reimmigration Crisis

Outside experts, including those at the Federal Reserve, consider the C.B.O.’s recent estimates to be more accurate. Some experts do think the C.B.O. estimate — of 2.4 million per year from 2021 to 2023 — is too high because it relies on administrative data that may miss some immigrants who return to their home countries. The estimates from Goldman are higher that others, as they estimate net migration to be more than two million per year.

It is not clear what will happen next. During the presidential campaign, Mr. Trump promised to conduct mass deportations, and many Americans favor the policy. According to the New York Times/Siena College poll, a majority of voters support deporting immigrants who are living in the country illegally.

But the logistics of finding, apprehending and deporting millions of people would not be simple. Public support for the policy could decline if it swept up immigrants who had been in the country for years and established lives here. The Obama administration deported more than 400,000 people per year, compared to the 300,000 deported by the Trump administration.

Whatever the number in a second Trump term, the recent immigration surge has probably ended. Mr. Biden has been cracking down since the summer, and Mr. Trump promises harsher border policies when he becomes president. Many would-be immigrants will likely be less likely to try to get into the country due to the lower likelihood of success.

There is an historical echo with a century ago. The immigration wave of the late 1800s and early 1900s also sparked a political backlash, leading to a 1924 law that tightly restricted immigration. Those restrictions remained largely in place for more than four decades.

The combination of census and C.B.O. data has been used by The Times in their recent immigration analysis. We worked with experts in the government and elsewhere to pair the two data sets.

The census data is based on surveys. The data from the C.B.O is derived from both surveys and records from various government agencies. From 2010 to 2019, the data comes from the American Community Survey and from 2020 to 2023, it comes from the C.B.O. and the A.C.S.

The conclusion of the analysis still stands even if the C.B.O. estimate is more accurate compared to Goldman’s estimate.

The immigration surge is overstated because of the analysis ending in July 2023. (The census’s main population estimates are for July 1 of the listed year.) Immigration remained high for about 12 months after the summer of 2023, until Mr. Biden’s crackdown.

In July of this year, the foreign-born share of the U.S. population reached 15.5 percent, the Goldman Sachs numbers suggest. C.B.O.’s estimates suggest the share was about 16 percent. In 2020, the share was 13.6 percent. In 1890, the previous high was 14.8 percent.