From Cross-Cultural Communications weekly newsletter:
Many Americans Wrongly Believe Most Immigrants Are “Illegal”
First, to get this out of the way: no person is “illegal.” But that is a colloquial term that many here in the U.S. use to refer to undocumented immigrants.
That said, even I was a bit startled to learn about this study from the highly respect Pew Research center. It reported more than a third of Americans wrongly believe that most immigrants to the U.S. are here illegally.
In fact, 75% of immigrants here are legal residents.