The number of undocumented workers in Wisconsin has stayed relatively stable since 2007, according to a study conducted by the Pew Hispanic Center.
The study, which addresses trends in illegal immigration across the country from 2009 to 2012, says that Wisconsin’s 85,000 undocumented workers make up 1.5 percent of the state’s population and 1.8 percent of its labor force, less than the national averages of 3.5 percent and 5.1 percent, respectively.
The study also reported 55,000 people work illegally in the state while spouses and minors make up the rest of the undocumented population.
The number of undocumented immigrants nationwide was pegged at 11.2 million in the report. Like in Wisconsin, this number has stayed roughly the same since the last time data was collected in 2007.
Gov. Scott Walker has stopped short of supporting pathways for undocumented workers to become citizens but does want them to remain in the country.
“If people want to come here and work hard and benefit … I want them here,” he said in a July 2013 interview with the Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune, acknowledging that many Wisconsin farms benefit from migrant labor.
More recently, Walker called the plight of undocumented minors in the U.S. “heartbreaking.”
“You think of the trauma these kids are going through to get here, and you think of the trauma before that,” Walker said in July. “I put them on my own personal prayer list.”
On the national level, President Barack Obama and Republican congressional leaders have recently sparred over the possibility of unilateral executive action that would prevent the deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants.
