9.5 Migration and Immigration in the 1990s and 2000s

The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 ended the old national-origins quotas that had favored Europeans and gave preference to family reunification and needed skills. Its effects built over time. The foreign-born share of the population rose from about 6 percent in 1980 to about 13 percent in 2010, close to the record set around 1890–1910.

Most newcomers came from Latin America and Asia. Mexico was the largest single source. Others came from the Philippines, China, India, Vietnam, Korea, Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Central America, where civil wars in El Salvador and Guatemala in the 1980s drove many people north. Push factors included poverty, war and political repression; pull factors included jobs, family already in the U.S. and freedom. The Hispanic population grew from about 14.6 million in 1980 to about 50.5 million in 2010, and Latinos became the nation's largest minority group in the early 2000s.

• Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA, 1986): signed by Reagan, it gave legal status to about 2.7 million undocumented immigrants, most of whom had lived in the U.S. since before 1982. It also made it illegal for employers to knowingly hire unauthorized workers, but enforcement was weak.
• Immigration Act of 1990: raised the number of legal immigrants admitted each year and created the diversity visa lottery and H-1B visas for skilled workers.
• California's Proposition 187 (1994): voters approved denying public services such as schooling to undocumented immigrants, but courts blocked most of it. It showed rising anger in some places.
• After 2000: the undocumented population peaked at about 12 million around 2007. Congress funded more border fencing and enforcement but repeatedly failed to pass broad reform. In spring 2006 huge crowds, including more than half a million people in Los Angeles, marched for immigrant rights and reform. In 2012 the DACA program let many undocumented people brought to the U.S. as children apply for temporary protection from deportation.

Immigrants supplied an important labor force in agriculture, construction, meatpacking, health care, restaurants and technology. Spanish-language media such as Univision grew, Asian American and Latino writers like Amy Tan (The Joy Luck Club, 1989) and Sandra Cisneros reached wide audiences, and food, music and religious life became more varied.

Americans argued over assimilation, the process of immigrants adopting the language and customs of their new country. Debates over bilingual education and 'English only' laws were common. Asian Americans were often labeled a 'model minority,' a stereotype that ignored big differences in income and experience among groups.

Americans kept moving to the Sun Belt, the warm states stretching from the Carolinas and Florida to Texas, Arizona and California. Air conditioning, lower taxes, right-to-work laws (which bar contracts requiring workers to pay union fees), defense and technology industries, and retirees seeking warm weather all drew people. Many African Americans moved back to Southern cities like Atlanta and Houston, reversing the earlier Great Migration.

Population brings political power. After the 2010 census, Texas gained four seats in the House and Florida two, while New York and Ohio each lost two. Every president elected from 1976 through 2004 built his career in the South or West: Carter (Georgia), Reagan (California), both Bushes (Texas) and Clinton (Arkansas). The region also became a base for the Republican Party, continuing the shift of white Southern voters that began in the civil rights era, and Sun Belt cities like Atlanta, Houston and Los Angeles grew as centers of business and culture.