For the first time in at least half a century, more immigrants left the United States than entered last year, according to new estimates released Tuesday by economists at the Brookings Institution.
Net migration to the United States fell by between 10,000 and 295,000 in 2025, according to an update of estimates first released in the summer by economists Wendy Edelberg and Tara Watson, of center-left Brookings, and Stan Veuger, of the conservative American Enterprise Institute.
While arrests and deportations by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement have been in the spotlight, the report’s authors attribute the majority of the drop-off in immigration to a slowdown in new arrivals orchestrated by President Donald Trump’s administration — from the near-closure of the U.S.-Mexico border to new visa restrictions and fees and the end of many humanitarian migrant programs, including for nearly all refugees.
Another factor includes deportations, which the economists estimate amounted to around 300,000 in 2025, less than just over 600,000 as described by the Trump administration.
The Brookings estimates differ from another set of estimates released by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office last week that show net migration was around 400,000 in 2025. The CBO figures assume that fewer immigrants were deported and voluntarily left the country in 2025 than the Brookings’ model.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration and some think tanks, including the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for immigration restrictions, have said that migration was far more negative than the Brookings economists estimate, by relying on a higher level of departures and deportations.
Official government counts of immigration levels from 2025 will not be available until later this year and may not contain precise data on how many people left the country.
The United States is already on track to lose more immigrants than it gains in 2026, with long-term consequences for the economy and population growth, the researchers said.
“The slowdown implies weaker employment, GDP, and consumer spending growth,” they wrote in a paper accompanying the new migration estimates.
The economists forecast that net immigration in 2026 could be even lower, but they warn that immigration levels remain uncertain due to “recent reductions in data transparency,” such as a pause on State Department visa issuance statistics since May.
Experts say U.S. migration could be at a turning point, after a surge in immigration during the Biden administration, when 2 to 3 million immigrants arrived each year. That migration wave pushed the share of foreign-born workers in the U.S. labor force to the highest level on record, fueling the country’s economic boom after the pandemic.
For the Trump administration, the goal has been the expulsion and exclusion of immigrants. “Promises Made. Promises Kept. NEGATIVE NET MIGRATION for the First Time in 50 Years!” President Donald Trump declared on social media in August, although official government data on migration levels in 2025 has not been released. Over the past year, the White House has repeatedly said that reduced immigration is helping lower crime and improve U.S.-born workers’ access to jobs and housing, though these claims are disputed by economists and other experts.
The Trump administration has also been touting very high levels of people leaving the country. The Department of Homeland Security said in December that 1.9 million undocumented immigrants “voluntarily self-deported” since January 2025 — compared to Brookings estimate of 200,000 to 400,000 voluntary exits last year of both authorized and unauthorized immigrants.
Some economists, including Jed Kolko, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and a former Commerce Department economist, have said they believe the Trump administration is misusing Census data to infer those numbers.
The economists behind this latest Brookings report say that a net loss of immigrants last year and this year has economic ramifications that are rippling across the U.S. Consumer spending is expected to fall by between $60 billion and $110 billion over 2025 and 2026, their estimates found, as some immigrants leave and others who remain in the country pull back their spending.
Meanwhile, the economy is already creating fewer jobs, partly due to immigration restrictions. Last year job creation plummeted; it was the second weakest year for growth since the Great Recession, according to Labor Department data released last week.
The economists wrote that they expect negative immigration to have little impact on prices and inflation because businesses will experience reduced demand for goods and services, as labor demand declines.
They calculated their forecasts for net immigration in 2025 and 2026 by making high and low estimates for migration inflows — including green cards and temporary visas issued from abroad, unauthorized immigration and parole, and outflows — including deportations and the voluntary departure of immigrants.
In the lead-up to Trump’s crackdown, nearly all growth of the U.S. population and workforce had been fueled by immigration because of an aging native-born population and declining fertility rates.
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