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Florida: Illegal Aliens
FAIR's estimate of the state's illegal alien population as of 2007 is about 810,000 persons. This is part of an overall estimate of the U.S. illegal alien population of about 13 million persons.
INS ESTIMATE
The INS (now dissolved into the Dept. of Homeland Security) estimated in February 2003 that the population of illegal immigrants in Florida in January 2000 was 337,000. This was a drop from the previous INS estimate that in October 1996 the population was about 350,000 illegal residents. The INS estimated the illegal resident alien population in Florida as of October 1992 at 270,000. The current estimate is the fifth largest concentration of illegal aliens in the country.
In November 2006, DHS updated the estimate of the state's illegal alien population to 850,000, an increase of over 500,000since 2003! The most recent estimate by DHS put the illegal population in the state at 980,000 in 2006.
The state government has estimated the illegal alien population higher -- about 420,000 (per the Associated Press, April 22, 1997). These are mostly new illegal resident aliens since 1986, as the amnesty for illegal aliens, for which 156,000 applied from Florida, converted the bulk of older illegal aliens in legal permanent residents. The decline in the INS estimate from 1996 to 2000 is also likely due to Cuban, Haitian and Nicaraguan and some other illegal aliens having benefited from amnesty provisions and gained green cards.
INS data listed in 1991 the number of applicants from Florida for the amnesty for illegal aliens adopted in 1986 as 152,898 (50,137 long-term illegal residents and 102,761 agricultural workers.
OTHER ESTIMATES
The Pew Hispanic Center estimated in March 2005 that the illegal alien population in Florida was 850,000 in 2004.
Based upon the new 2000 Census data, the Migration Policy Institute issued a May 2002 study that estimated Florida's illegal alien population at 700,000.
Incarceration Costs—Florida has received partial compensation under the federal State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP) that was established in 1994 to compensate the states and local jurisdictions for incarceration of "undocumented," aliens who are serving time for a felony conviction or at least two misdemeanors.
The recent SCAAP amounts that Florida has received were:
FY'00—$30,131,106
FY'01—$28,623,740
FY'02—$27,956,315
FY'03—$11,188,630
FY'04—$14,267,545
The amount of SCAAP awards has been declining in both total distributions and even more as a share of the state's expenses. In FY'99 the state received 38.6% of its costs. SCAAP data indicate that Florida's illegal alien inmate population had increased by 83 percent from the 3,054 inmate years in FY'99 to 5,596 inmate years in FY'02, while compensation rose by 29 percent, but then fell off steeply.
Medical Costs—Under the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, hospitals with emergency rooms are required to treat and stabilize patients with emergency medical needs regardless whether or not they are in the country legally or whether they are able to pay for the treatment. Congress in 2003 enacted an appropriation of $250 million per year (for 4 years) to help offset some of the costs due to use of this service by illegal aliens. This amount has been allocated among the states based upon estimates of the illegal alien population and data on the apprehension of illegal aliens in each state. This amount compensates only a fraction of the medical outlays. For Florida, the proposed payment in fiscal year 2004 is $8,844,117.
Educational Costs—In our study Breaking the Piggy Bank: How Illegal Immigration is Sending Schools into the Red, we estimated based on 2004 data that educational expenditures for illegal immigration were costing the Florida taxpayer $1.243 billion dollars annually. This cost was partially for educating students who were themselves illegally in the country ($518.1 million) and in part for the education of their siblings born in the United States to illegal residents ($725.3 million).
Projected Fiscal Costs—In 2006 we estimated that Floridian taxpayers are currently burdened with annual costs of about $1.820 billion because of illegal aliens residing in the state. That estimate was based on only expenditures for education, emergency medical care and incarceration. We projected that those costs will rise unless we gain control over our borders and our worksites. If a new amnesty and increases in immigrants and guest workers were enacted, as proposed by business and ethnic advocacy groups, we project that the cost to the state's taxpayers for those same programs would rise to $3.094 billion per year in 2010 and to $5.352 billion per year in 2020.
