Washington
CNN
—
The Trump administration is cracking down on immigration — legal and otherwise — setting the stage for potential labor shortages, weaker economic growth and higher inflation.
President Donald Trump announced a flurry of immigration policies immediately after taking office in late January, many of them aimed at curbing illegal entries — a core tenet of his presidential campaign. But he’s also chipped away at legal avenues, such as shutting down the asylum-seeking process at the US-Mexico border and canceling flights for refugees who had already been vetted.
“The reality is that we depend on immigrant labor in this country and Trump’s policies could have enormous consequences for many industries,” Jorge Loweree, managing director of programs at the American Immigration Council, told CNN.
In the past, Trump has said he’d welcome legal immigrants, saying “we have to have the quality people coming in” on his second day in office. Last week, he unveiled a “gold card” visa program for wealthy foreigners to live and work in the US.
But several experts tell CNN that legal immigration is expected to decline throughout Trump’s second term as his administration fosters a hostile environment for immigrants through its policies and messaging, which could lead to fewer available workers across industries and higher inflation. There are already signs of legal immigration slowing.
“It’s been surprisingly quiet,” Melissa Lopez, an attorney and executive director of Estrella Del Paso immigration legal services firm, told CNN. “I’ve been doing this for 17 and a half years here in El Paso, and this feels low.”
As Americans have fewer children, its population is starting to age. That means the health care industry is increasingly desperate for workers to care for the elderly. And industries that rely on younger people, including construction and agriculture, are in need of staff.
Economists say immigration is the solution America’s economy needs. That’s a dilemma — because the White House says immigration is the problem.
Legal immigration to the US dropped off in 2020 because of pandemic-era restrictions, but climbed sharply in the following years.
Last year, about 2.8 million people immigrated to the United States legally, according to the Census Bureau. That includes refugees and those entering the country through worker visas, accounting for 84% of the country’s population growth in 2024.
A report from the right-leaning Cato Institute released last month argued that today’s high level of immigration gives Trump “more room to implement restrictions” as it tries to “appease his nativist base and the nationalist political class by cutting legal immigration.”
“I expect we’ll see further restrictions by the summer,” said David Bier, director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute. The Trump administration is considering invoking a public health order labeling migrants at the southern border seeking asylum as risks for spreading diseases — a power officials used during the pandemic to seal off the border.
Allianz Trade forecasts legal immigration to be cut nearly by half by 2026. Coupled with mass deportations, that slowdown in immigration could prompt population growth to drop 0.2% that year.
Jennifer Babaie, director of advocacy and legal services at Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center, said she expects it “to be much more difficult for folks to apply for anything” in the coming years, ultimately reducing the number of people who successfully immigrate to the US legally.
“We’re expecting delays, both because personnel in the court has dropped and also because (immigration and customs) personnel and funding is at risk,” Babaie said. “We’re also now spending hours going into detention just trying to interview folks to understand what is going on because we’re not getting any information or cooperation from the administration, and that cuts into the time that we could be working on a complicated brief.”
There were 47.8 million immigrants in the United States in 2023, with a total of $1.7 trillion in spending power and who paid about $652 billion in taxes, according the American Immigration Council. That economic might is at risk from Trump’s immigration agenda.
The Allianz Trade forecast estimates that Trump’s crackdown on illegal and legal immigration could drag down GDP to an annualized growth rate of below 2% by 2026. The Brookings Institution estimates that growth could be 0.4 percentage-point lower this year, if Trump continues to restrict legal immigration and manages to conduct 3.4 million deportations. On the campaign trail, Trump said he wants to deport “probably 15 million and maybe as many as 20 million” people, which would be a complicated and costly undertaking.
Immigrants comprise more than 20% of employment in agriculture, construction, transportation, warehousing, general services and waste services, the American Immigration Council estimates. That means employers in those industries are expected to be in a bind as Trump proceeds with mass deportations and limiting legal immigration.
“These industries have very tight labor markets, so being very restrictive and aggressive on immigration is not going to give Trump that economic growth and success that he wants,” said Giovanni Peri, an economics professor at the University of California, Davis, who studies the intersection of immigration and labor.
Peri said that labor shortages, spurred by a clamp-down on immigration, could result in rising prices for food, housing and tourism. He added that immigration labor is essential also because of the country’s changing demographics.
“In a situation in which there are going to be many more Americans retiring, more immigration would really benefit the labor market and the growth in the economy,” Peri said.