Migrants Taking the Blame for Housing Issues: US Edition

Wednesday on prime time television President Trump took aim at immigration again, this time on the topic of housing. I wrote about the Dutch version of this a few months back, led by Wilders and the far-right PVV.

The current US administration is taking the same line now in the run up to 2026 mid-terms, and until things change structurally, this will continue to be a popular talking point. Economic anxiety and housing scarcity are top concerns for millenial/gen z, which means politicians will tap into it however they can for the foreseeable future.

What's interesting about the US flavor of this is the HUD report published last month that painted "excess demand" as the primary driver for rental and housing markets. I've covered multiple academic deep dives, from Canada and Denmark for example, studying the link between immigration and housing costs. Authors of both of these papers state the average uptick in housing costs associated with immigrants is ~11%, and the authors are very careful to mention that restricted supply is the primary driver of lack of affordability.

In contrast, the HUD report claims that in California and New York, immigrants have accounted for 100 percent of all rental growth and over half of all growth in owner-occupied housing in recent years. Even as building has reached record rates (591.6K new apartment units last year alone), the "unchecked flow of migrants" has, to their belief, outpaced supply and been a major factor in the collapse of housing affordability.

I'll leave the actual researchers to dissect the methodology of the HUD report, but many of the talking points politicians have taken up on the back of its publication conveniently ignore the sections around zoning, permitting, and investment incentives that it claims have also contributed to rising prices.

In any case, the President is promising a massive housing reform announcement early in 2026, so we'll all see in short order whether this is mostly political theater, aimed at scapegoating immigrants, or if there's an actual appetite to address the structural issues at the same time. Keep y'all posted.