As domestic security has tightened and the economy has weakened, Americans have focused on solving the issue of illegal immigration and recovering the costs associated with it. Unfortunately, Minnesota has suffered sustained negative impact from the cost of illegal immigration in recent years due to a largely static population.
An estimated 95,000 illegal immigrants lived in Minnesota in 2012,
according to data from the Pew Research Center. They made up 1.8 percent of the state's population.
The annual costs to Minnesota’s taxpayers were estimated at $744 million,
according to data from the Federation for American Immigration Reform.
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FAIR reported the following costs associated with illegal immigration in Minnesota, broken down as such:
- $367 million went to education
- $99 million to healthcare
- $64 million to justice and law enforcement
- $77 million to public assistance
- $138 million to general government services
FAIR reported the deficit was calculated before state revenue from illegal immigrants, totaling $27 million, was counted.
However, MinnPost, reported that an estimated 91,000 illegal immigrants "paid $87 million in state and local taxes in 2012."
Nationally, according to the Pew Research Center, the undocumented immigrant population had "leveled off" after dipping some during the Great Recession.
In 2012, "an estimated 11.2 million unauthorized immigrants lived in the U.S., down from a peak of 12.2 million in 2007 but unchanged since 2009," Pew noted.
In Minnesota, population trends reflected the national pattern indicated by a stable number of unauthorized immigrants, a group that experienced no "statistically significant" fluctuation in size from 2009 to 2012.
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