Immigration and the changing face of rural America

past 16 years exceeds the population of 46 states, and the number of Mexican immigrants admitted legally exceeds the population of 23 states. In 1996, there were 25 million foreign-born persons in the United States, including 5 million who were not authorized to be here. Most immigrants settle in urban areas. In fiscal year 1995, only 43,600 or 6 percent of the 720,500 immigrants admitted to the United States indicated that they intended to settle outside a metropolitan statistical area, an area defined as a city of 50,000 or more, or an urbanized area with at least 100,000 residents. However, much of the labor-intensive agriculture in the United States is in metro areas, so immigrants in the Fresno, Salinas or Stockton metro areas may well be farmworkers attracted to the United States to fill farm jobs. Agriculture and related industries play an important role in bringing unauthorized and unskilled Mexican immigrants into the United States, a fact highlighted by U.S. legalization programs in 1987-88. Through two distinct legalization programs, one for persons residing in the United States illegally since January 1