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Encyclopedia of American Immigration, 2nd Edition

Guatemalan immigrants

by Elizabeth Ellen Cramer

Significance: Civil war, natural disasters, and economic hardships combined to cause Guatemalan immigration to the United States to begin a rise during the 1960s that has continued to grow into the twenty-first century. By 2013, Guatemalans had become the sixth-largest Latin American immigrant community in the United States and the fourth largest Central American community.

Before 1930, the U.S. Census did not break down Central American immigration by countries, but in any case, overall immigration from that region was small. According to the U.S. Census, only 423 Guatemalans were formally admitted into the United States during the 1930s. The number of Guatemalan immigrants remained low until the 1960s, when a significant increase began to occur. The majority of Guatemalan immigrants have arrived in the United States since the mid-1980s.

During the 1980s, the number of Guatemalans granted legal permanent resident status reached almost 60,000, continuing a growth pattern that started during the 1960s. The numbers of immigrants have continued to rise, with 145,111 Guatemalans being granted legal permanent resident status between 2000 and 2008. The 2000 U.S. Census listed the total number of Guatemalan immigrants living in the United States as 480,665. Of that number, 111,375 were naturalized U.S. citizens and 369,290 were listed as “not a U.S. citizen.” As of the 2013 American Community Survey, there were 1.3 million people of Guatemalan origin living in the United States, of which 64 percent were foreign-born. Only 24 percent of Guatemalan immigrants were citizens. However, these numbers tell only a part of the story, as the majority of Guatemalan immigrants are undocumented.

Push-Pull Factors

Factors that have contributed to Guatemalan immigration into the United States have included Central American civil unrest, natural disasters, and economic problems. A thirty-six-year civil war began in Guatemala in 1960, when the right-wing military revolted against the increasingly liberal government. The war left thousands dead and drove tens of thousands to flee to Mexico and the United States. During the 1980s, Guatemalas indigenous communities endured the worst of the war’s violence, as they were suspected by the military of aiding the rebel forces. Because the U.S. government backed the right-wing Guatemalan leaders, it denied personal petitions for political asylum from Guatemalans during that period. The refusal to grant protected status prompted some religious groups in the United States to form the Sanctuary movement, an activist movement that aided undocumented immigrants from Guatemala and El Salvador.

Born in Guatemala, Norma Torres now serves as a U.S. congresswoman.

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A series of natural disasters in Guatemala left thousands of families without homes, land, or work, driving many of them to emigrate. In 1976, an earthquake destroyed much of Guatemala City and its environs, leaving 26,000 dead, 76,000 injured, and thousands more homeless. In 2005, Hurricane Stan caused torrential rain and mudslides that killed as many as 2,000 people in Guatemala and devastated entire villages.

A low standard of living, poor health care, and unfair land distribution have all contributed to Guatemalan immigration to the United States. Guatemala has high infant and child mortality rates, low life expectancy, and a terrible malnutrition problem. During the early twenty-first century, more than 60 percent of Guatemala’s people were living in poverty. The majority of the adult working population were engaged in migrant farm labor for the coffee, sugar, and cotton plantations.

For Guatemalans attempting to emigrate to the United States, the journey north is difficult, dangerous, and expensive. Fees for guides facilitating illegal entry into the United States can be as high as fifteen hundred U.S. dollars. Rape, robbery, injury, and death are some of the dangers in migrating north.

Transnational Guatemalan Immigrant Communities

The largest Guatemalan immigrant community in the United States is in Los Angeles. Other large Guatemalan immigrant communities have arisen in Houston, Chicago, New York City, Washington, DC, southern Florida, San Francisco, Miami, and the Phoenix-Tucson area in Arizona. These communities tend to be transnational; as their members work to create new lives for themselves in the United States, they continued to maintain ties with their home communities. Many Guatemalan immigrants send financial remittances to relatives in their Guatemalan hometowns that constitute a substantial portion of the latters’ incomes. In 2014, immigrants sent $5.5 billion to relatives in Guatemala.

A special problem arising from Guatemalan immigration has been the spread of gang culture from the United States to Guatemala. Beginning during the 1990s the U.S. government began targeting undocumented immigrants in the penal system for deportation. Many of these deportees have been in the United States so long that they have no memory of having lived in Guatemala. After they return to their original homeland, they tend to continue their criminal activities. The situation reached crisis proportions by 2017-2018, when large numbers of unaccompanied minors and family groups from Guatemala reached the U.S.-Mexico border seeking entry into the United States in order to escape violence at home. Most were either denied entry or apprehended and returned under immigration restrictions imposed by the Trump administration.

In 2017, there were about 960,000 Guatemalan immigrants in the United States, representing 27 percent of the total of immigrants from Central America. Most of these migrants had limited English proficiency.

Further Reading

1 

Fink, Leon, and Alvis E. Dunn. The Maya of Morganton: Work and Community in the Nuevo New South. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2003.

2 

Foxen, Patricia. In Search of Providence: Transnational Mayan Identities. Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University Press, 2007.

3 

Hamilton, Nora. Seeking Community in a Global City: Guatemalans and Salvadorans in Los Angeles. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2001.

4 

Jonas, Susanne, and Nestor Rogríguez. Guatemala-U.S. Migration: Transforming Regions. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2014.

5 

Lypez, Gustavo. “Hispanics of Guatemalan Origin in the United States, 2013-Statistical Profile.” Pew Research Center, September 15, 2015, www.pewhispanic.org/2015/09/15/hispanics-of-guatemalan-origin-in-the-united-states-2013.

6 

O’Connor, Allison, Jeanne Batalova, and Jessica Bolter. “Central American Immigrants in the United States.” Migration Policy Institute, August 15, 2019, www.migrationpolicy.org/article/central-american-immigrants-united-states-2017.

7 

Stolen, Kristi Anne. Guatemalans in the Aftermath of Violence: The Refugees’ Return. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007.

Citation Types

Type
Format
MLA 9th
Cramer, Elizabeth Ellen. "Guatemalan Immigrants." Encyclopedia of American Immigration, 2nd Edition, edited by Michael Shally-Jensen, Salem Press, 2021. Salem Online, online.salempress.com/articleDetails.do?articleName=AmImm2e_0237.
APA 7th
Cramer, E. E. (2021). Guatemalan immigrants. In M. Shally-Jensen (Ed.), Encyclopedia of American Immigration, 2nd Edition. Salem Press. online.salempress.com.
CMOS 17th
Cramer, Elizabeth Ellen. "Guatemalan Immigrants." Edited by Michael Shally-Jensen. Encyclopedia of American Immigration, 2nd Edition. Hackensack: Salem Press, 2021. Accessed October 22, 2025. online.salempress.com.