A combination of Texas business associations and the state’s Gulf Coast construction unions have stepped up a pro-immigrant campaign in the weeks leading up to the national presidential election, emphasizing the large number of immigrants who work in residential and non-residential construction in the state. industry
Released last month, the data and an accompanying message on immigration were prepared by Texans for Economic Growth, a business association, and the American Immigration Council, an immigrant nonprofit founded in 1987 by immigration lawyers. Supporters of the recent report include Gulf Coast Building & Construction Trades and the Greater Houston Builders Association.
Employers notice immigrants make up 40% of all employees in the construction industry, even though they make up only 17% of the state’s total population. Employers also suggest that immigrants are starting their own construction businesses and represent 39.7% of all entrepreneurs in the sector.
More than nine out of 10 immigrants come from Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. Only 2.1% comes from South America. A 2022 report suggested that nearly one in four workers in the industry are undocumented immigrants…23.3%, but they are necessary to fill the state labor shortage.
Texas has been front and center in the fierce debate over immigrants and their role in the US for many years. Former President Donald Trump has vowed to deport millions of undocumented immigrants in the U.S. The Biden administration has tightened border controls in recent months, and Vice President and current presidential candidate Kamala Harris has visited the border. She and other Democrats blame Republicans for not supporting comprehensive immigration reform.
Republicans have linked immigrants to crime and the heavy burden of providing housing and education. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (D) has supported Trump’s border wall project and sought to stem the flow of cross-border migrants who enter the United States illegally, seek asylum and stay in the United States. by asylum seekers by transporting immigrants to northern cities.
A deportation program on the scale described by Trump would cost tens of billions of dollars a year, according to the American Immigration Council.
