California’s inhabitants stalled in 2024 and progress throughout the county slowed amid widespread immigration raids within the first 12 months of the brand new Trump administration, U.S. Census Bureau information exhibits.
After years of gradual progress within the publish pandemic period, California’s inhabitants stayed primarily flat from July 2024 to July 2025, in response to Census Bureau information launched Tuesday. On the identical time, the information exhibits that the USA’ inhabitants grew by solely half a p.c, or roughly 1.8 million individuals, a a lot decrease charge than the earlier 12 months when it elevated by 3.2 million individuals.
Consultants attribute the stagnation largely to decrease ranges of migration to the USA from different international locations because the Trump administration has sought to curtail immigration and launched into deportation efforts in Los Angeles and different main cities. The foreign-born inhabitants within the U.S. dropped by 1.5 million individuals, or 2.6%, between January and July of final 12 months, information exhibits.
In California, altering immigration insurance policies, together with individuals leaving the Golden State for different locations, an getting old inhabitants and declining start charges all contribute to the inhabitants droop. Continued drops in immigration might have long-term implications for California, mentioned Dowell Myers, a professor of coverage planning and demography at USC.
“It’s a really unstable interval proper now, particularly with regard to immigration,” he mentioned. “There’s no coverage modifications that may change getting old and even start charges—you actually can’t transfer these—however immigration is the one factor you possibly can change. Immigration was an actual cease hole for us as a result of it supplies a recent provide of employees that we want. We are able to’t fill our all of our job vacancies so we depend on immigration.”
Previously 125 years, the bottom progress charge within the U.S. was in 2021, in the course of the peak of the coronavirus pandemic, when the inhabitants grew by simply 0.16%, or 522,000 individuals, and internet worldwide migration was simply 376,000 individuals due to journey restrictions into the U.S. Earlier than that, the bottom progress charge was slightly below 0.5% in 1919 on the peak of the Spanish flu.
Web worldwide migration to the U.S. peaked in 2024, with 2.7 million extra individuals arriving from overseas than leaving for different international locations, in response to Census information.
Final 12 months, that quantity declined by greater than half. From July 2024 to July 2025, just one.3 million extra individuals moved to the U.S. than those that moved away. The Census bureau projected that the development would proceed, with internet worldwide migration of simply 321,000 individuals in 2026. Census estimates are finally trending in direction of unfavourable internet migration, the place extra individuals depart the U.S. than arrive.
“If these tendencies proceed, it might be the primary time the USA has seen internet unfavourable migration in additional than 50 years,” the Census bureau wrote.
In California, the place inhabitants progress is lagging a lot of the remainder of the nation, the California Division of Finance projected final 12 months that sluggish progress would proceed as worldwide arrivals decreased.
The finance division pointed to the Trump administration’s termination of most humanitarian migration applications as a consider slowing California’s inhabitants progress.
“This isn’t essentially good for the economic system as a result of inhabitants progress means labor power progress,” mentioned Jan Brueckner, an emeritus professor of economics at UC Irvine. “If the inhabitants progress is unfavourable or has depressed then there’s a labor power problem and plenty of employers of unskilled employees are feeling the pinch.”
Over the previous few years, California has recorded extra individuals leaving for different states similar to Texas and Arizona than it positive factors from inside migration. Worldwide immigrants, who now largely come from Asia, bolster the state’s inhabitants towards the loss from those that depart for different states.
Shedding Californians to different states due to the excessive price of dwelling and housing provide goes to negatively have an effect on the long run workforce, Myers mentioned.
“We need to scale back our internet outflow of migrants and maintain on to the Californians that we obtained, particularly those that have been that have been raised in California faculties,” he mentioned. “We don’t need them to go away as a result of we’ve made funding in these younger individuals, however they will’t get jobs and so they can’t get housing. So housing is basically the most important menace for our future.”
