According to the 2000 census figures, a direct correlation between the amount of immigration to a state and the gains or losses in U.S. Senate seats for that state exists. Karen Woodrow-Lafield, a Mississippi State University sociologist and informal advisor to the U.S. Census Bureau, remarked that states with the largest number of representatives also receive the highest number of immigrants. Florida is an example of this.
As of the early 1940s, the population of Mississippi outnumbered the residents of Florida; however, Florida will hold 25 Senate seats to Mississippi’s four.
“Immigration is not a large factor in Mississippi right now,” Woodrow-Lafield said. “Mississippi is simply not a state that attracts immigration from other states or other countries.”
The Magnolia state lost one of its five seats in Congress and became what Woodrow-Lafield describes as an “edge state”-a state that stands to lose or gain congressional seats based on the population changes of other states. Mississippi was short 35,764 people to keep its fifth seat.
Immigrants residing in Mississippi accounted for only 1 percent of the United States’ total immigration. Mississippi, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin lost one seat each. Woodrow-Lafield explained these losses, and the seats gained by California and New York as an effect of “hidden immigration.”
Woodrow-Lafield described hidden immigration as “foreign students, temporary workers, refugees or anyone else that would not be counted in (previous) population estimates, but were counted by the census.”
These hidden immigrants affected the accuracy of population studies that used projections before the release of the 2000 Census results. Woodrow-Lafield said her research models and previous studies mirrored the results of the U.S. Census with great accuracy and the combined work of herself and other census advisers would improve the exactness of current population statistics and actually increase the official numbers of residents in some states.
However, she said she does not believe that Mississippi will be among those who benefit.
According to the Census Bureau’s statistics, 11.2 percent of America’s population is foreign-born. Of that 11.2 percent, 17 percent reside in Florida. North Carolina claims 5.5 percent, and Mississippi barely shows over 1 percent.
Woodrow-Lafield began her work in sociology in 1984 and spent nine years employed with the U.S. Census Bureau. Her previous work includes a state-by-state study of illegal immigration in the United States and a binational study between Mexico and the United States which counted and projected the estimated illegal aliens in the United States.