President Donald Trump’s firm defense of the nation’s borders has caused roughly 75 million foreigners to abandon hope of migrating into the United States, according to a 2025 poll just released by Gallup.
“In 2025, 15% of adults worldwide who say they would like to move permanently to another country name the U.S. as their preferred destination, the lowest level recorded in nearly two decades of Gallup research,” said Gallup’s press release.
Still, the 15 percent adds up to 134 million who would migrate into the United States if enabled by pro-migration Democrats, business groups, and establishment Republicans, such as amnesty advocates Rep. Maria Salazar (R-FL) and retiring Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE).
Any vast inflow of migrants slashes wages and spikes housing costs for ordinary people. It also discourages investors from building the high-tech prosperity economy sought by Trump in place of a Biden-style low-wage diversity economy.
The survey includes responses from 144,000 adults in 140 countries.
Gallup’s report downplayed Trump’s win by not using the term “migrant” in the headline, which said, “Desire to Move Permanently to U.S. at New Low.”
The migration drop-off was strongest in the regions blocked by Trump’s border reforms — Central America and South America — Gallup reported:
Latin America accounts for seven of the 16 countries worldwide where the percentage naming the U.S. as a preferred destination fell by at least 10 points. In the region, the percentage fell from 33% in 2024 to 28% in 2025.
Other Latin American countries that saw double-digit declines include U.S. neighbor Mexico, where the latest 21% who want to move to the U.S. matches the previous low set in 2017 and 2018. In Honduras, desire to migrate to the U.S. dropped 35 percentage points, from 71% to 36%, the largest decline in any country in 2025.
Migration also causes more migration by wrecking the economies in the migrants’ home and destination countries.
For example, a rising share of young people in advanced countries want to emigrate from countries where governments import many migrants, the poll shows. “Migration desire in the United States and Canada (20%) and the European Union (21%) remains near record highs,” Gallup reported.
Good government policy can lower emigration by building up home-country economies: “[In] El Salvador, the percentage of adults wanting to leave fell sharply [in 2025], from levels above 50% in several prior years to … 25%,” Gallup reported.
Trump’s migration reforms also reduced the deaths of migrants in the Americas during 2025, the United Nations has admitted.
But migration and migrant deaths remain high among the sub-Saharan Muslim countries south of Europe, whose progressive-run central government is deliberately using migration to fracture the political clout of European old nations and young citizens.
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