How many undocumented in Florida
Executive summary
Current estimates of Florida’s undocumented (unauthorized) population diverge sharply because sources use different definitions, timeframes and methods; the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s 2023 estimate places the state’s unauthorized population at about 590,000, while Pew Research and some reporting in 2025 have produced figures as high as 1.6 million for mid‑2025—so a defensible range today is roughly 0.6 million to 1.6 million, with most longer‑running demographic series clustering nearer the lower end [1] [2] [3].
1. The official statistical baseline: DHS and demographers point to roughly 590,000 in 2023
Demographers who rely on Department of Homeland Security (DHS) state estimates and Census surveys report that, in 2023, about 590,000 immigrants living in Florida lacked legal status, a figure widely cited in academic and public‑media summaries of Florida’s immigrant profile and presented as the most recent DHS‑based snapshot available to researchers [1] [4].
2. Why other credible sources give higher or lower numbers—method matters
Different organizations are using different tools: Migration Policy Institute and academic teams impute unauthorized status from pooled American Community Survey and SIPP microdata using expert weighting, Pew aggregates survey and administrative indicators to produce a national total that can be apportioned to states, and advocacy groups compile administrative, household and program‑level counts; those methodological differences explain why MPI/Pew/DHS/advocacy numbers can differ by hundreds of thousands even for the same year [5] [6] [3].
3. The spike narratives: why some reporting shows 1.6 million in 2025
Recent reporting citing Pew Research’s 2025 work says Florida’s unauthorized population rose to about 1.6 million by mid‑2025, a jump attributed by analysts to new flows under humanitarian and parole programs and to changes in state‑level reception of migrants from Cuba, Venezuela, Haiti and Nicaragua; Pew’s broader 2023–2025 work also documented a record national unauthorized population that affects state tallies and can produce very different point estimates depending on the mid‑year chosen [2] [3].
4. Smaller and intermediate estimates: advocacy groups and past snapshots
Nonprofit analyses and state fact sheets offer other numbers: a 2019 fact sheet cited roughly 656,000 undocumented in Florida, a 2025 FWD.us fact sheet reported specific long‑term cohorts (e.g., 487,000 undocumented living in the U.S. 10+ years) and journal articles have cited figures near 772,000—these fall between the DHS 590,000 and Pew’s larger mid‑2025 tally, illustrating how timing (2019 vs 2023 vs 2025), inclusion of people with limited protections (TPS, DACA, parole) and rounding conventions change totals [7] [8] [9].
5. Politics, enforcement and why the number matters for policy
The count is politically freighted: Florida officials highlight enforcement actions—state announcements of thousands of arrests and a campaign labeled Operation Tidal Wave—to argue for rapid removals and tougher state measures, while researchers and advocates stress the economic footprint and long tenure of many unauthorized immigrants and warn that enforcement‑oriented tallies and arrest counts are a different metric than population estimates and can be used to justify policy choices [10] [11] [8].
6. Bottom line and what can’t be resolved from current reporting
The best reconciliation of the available reporting is to present a range: about 590,000 by DHS‑anchored 2023 estimates, commonly cited mid‑range figures between roughly 0.65–0.8 million in several nonprofit or academic briefings, and a much higher Pew‑reported figure of about 1.6 million for mid‑2025; precise current counts cannot be known from public sources because of methodological differences, changing migration flows and the lag in official data release [1] [7] [2] [3].