Some are looking towards Denmark as a model for re-setting immigration policy. That country has been in the forefront of center/left parties to approach immigration restriction. Both countries experienced immigration shocks: for Denmark, a wave of refugees in the 2010s; for the U.S. under Biden, a doubling of the annual number of new foreign-born. Here are what is different and what is similar in immigration.
In a speech to parliament, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen portraed Denmark as a high-trust society whose welfare, prosperity, and everyday functioning depend on mutual responsibility among citizens and institutions. She warns that this trust is eroding due to inequality, over-centralization, bureaucracy, and policy failures. Immigration is the most acute strain: failed integration, crime, and parallel communities weaken cohesion, while unfair generalization harms those who contribute positively. She advocates a stricter, more controlled immigration policy with clear expectations—work, law-abiding behavior, and cultural integration—alongside fairness toward successful immigrants. Her broader recommendations include rebuilding welfare, reducing bureaucratic micromanagement (“closeness reform”), strengthening local responsibility, investing in public services, and restoring honesty in politics to rebuild social trust and democratic confidence.
David Leonhardt in the NY Times drew upon Frederikson to express misgivings about Democratic acceptance of a high level of immigration:
“Immigration has often been chaotic, extralegal and more rapid than voters want. The citizens of Europe, the United States and other countries were never directly asked whether they wanted to admit millions more people, and they probably would have said no if the question had appeared on a ballot….Trump won in 2016 and 2024 partly by running on a platform of mass deportation. In Europe, the parties of the far right were long the only opponents of immigration, and they have been rewarded with large gains…..For progressives in the United States, Denmark may not be an especially comfortable exemplar. The cruel aspects of Trump’s immigration policy have understandably outraged many people. But in Germany and Sweden, politicians who once criticized Frederiksen’s approach have since begun to emulate it, and for center-left parties around the world, Denmark offers a glimpse at what a different version of the left can look like — more working-class, more community-focused and more restrictive on immigration.
Their experience with immigration in the past 40 years has been dramatically different:
Denmark’s foreign-born population in 1980 was 3% of the total; in2000: 6–7%; iin 2020; 10–11%. That is a 3 times-plus increase in 40 years. 30% of this population today are refugee households.
The U.S. foreign-born share of total population in 1980 was 6%; in 2000, 11%; in 2020, 14%, thus a doubling. 10-15% are refugee households – a much higher percentage was voluntary immigration.
What further distinguishes the United States from Denmark:
Historic large cities have a century’s experience in integrating large immigrant populations.. The voluntary immigrant population is more confident that hard work gets you ahead. They are more sure (70% to 47%) that their children will prosper. Many recent arrivals hew closely to American role model lives. More speak English, in part because more have learned some English before arrival. They more closely match native-born persons in educational attainment than when immigration spiked intensely in the 1980s.
Where it is similar is in small towns and states wit very low initial foregn-born populations. Expansion of the foreign-born population in the U.S has mirrors Denmark’s – from very low levels in the past – 1-2% in many counties – to much more, and rapidly. For the first 80 years of the 20th Century, immigrants settled along the coasts and the Mexican border. Since then, the immigrant population has risen from under 15 million to over 42 million. The immigrant share of adults has more than quadrupled in 232 counties.