A National Guardsman monitors surveillance cameras at a Border Patrol post near Yuma, Arizona. (Photo: Dept. of Defense/Sgt. Jim Greenhill, U.S. Army)

Six in 10 Americans believe that, in principle, immigration is a “good thing” for the country, but three-quarters (77 percent) worry that it may be too easy for illegal immigrants to come into the country.

The U.S. admits more than one million immigrants a year, and more than 12 percent of the U.S. population is foreign-born.

There are an estimated 11.7 million illegal or undocumented immigrants in the country. U.S. border agents say they apprehended over one million people in 2006.

Current laws emphasize family ties for admission, and most legal immigrants are, in fact, relatives of people already here.

Although legal immigration rates are historically high, they have fallen since the early 1990s.

More than half of immigrants settle in just four “gateway” states (California, Florida, New York and Texas). Increasingly, however, immigrants are moving to areas of the country with very little history of immigration.

More than half of illegal or undocumented immigrants come from Mexico and Central America.

Despite widespread dissatisfaction with the current immigration system, Congress was unable to pass compromise legislation in 2006, even though it had the support of leading Democrats and Republicans.

Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Foreign-Born Population; U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Yearbook of Immigration Statistics; Public Agenda, People's Chief Concerns on Immigration