During a speech in January, Georgia Congressman Rich McCormick said that Indian Americans are “some of the best citizens we have in America” and called for a “streamlined” immigration process for those who have come to the United States to “obey the law, pay their taxes and be the most creative and productive in society.”
Although Americans of Indian origin are often presented in this manner as “model” migrants, an increased number of Indians sought unauthorized entry to the US in 2022, according to US Customs and Border Patrol data.
In 2022, 63,927 undocumented Indians reached the US borders and sought asylum, which is more than double the previous year’s figure. The US southern border with Mexico is a common arrival point.
From October 2021 to September 2022, US border authorities stopped Indian migrants “18,300 times” at the US southern border, according to the Migration Policy Institute’s (MPI) 2022 report
on Indian immigration to the US. This is a spike from 2,600 encounters recorded the previous year.
Lopita Nath, professor of history and Asian Studies at the University of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio, Texas, said that this increase in unauthorized Indian arrivals could serve to tarnish the positive image of Indian immigration.
“If the numbers grow as exponentially as they are now, the Indian diaspora will not be very happy about it, because it gives a bad name to the legal migrants,” she told DW.
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