Treasury Chief Scott Bessent Links Immigration Cuts to Bigger Paychecks and More Jobs

At a recent “State of the Economy” gathering in Washington, D.C., Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent leaned into a point that’s been buzzing around Capitol Hill: slowing the flow of immigrants, he said, is directly translating into fatter paychecks for many American workers.

"The underlying fundamentals are fantastic and accelerating," Bessent told Breitbart’s Washington bureau chief Matthew Boyle, flashing a smile before diving into the numbers. He noted that while job statistics can sometimes be noisy, the trend has been unmistakably upward – “when was the last time you got an upward revision?” he asked, half‑joking.

What caught listeners’ attention, though, was Bessent’s focus on labor‑market supply and demand, especially as it relates to immigration. “We’re seeing that workers without a college degree are enjoying the best employment conditions in over a decade,” he said, referencing data that rolls back to the first term of President Trump.

He highlighted that the bottom 25 percent of earners have seen wage growth nearly 3.5 times faster than the top quartile, pushing the median wage up by roughly three and a half percent. "A lot of that, we attribute to stopping the open‑border flow and the 2‑3 million deportations that followed," Bessent asserted, his tone mixing confidence with a dash of conviction.

In plain English, the secretary’s message was simple: when the U.S. reins in what he calls “mass, unfettered immigration,” American workers – particularly those without college degrees – end up making more money and finding more jobs. Critics might argue the picture is more nuanced, but Bessent walked off the stage convinced he’d laid out a clear cause‑and‑effect story.

Whether policymakers will take his assessment to heart remains to be seen, but the Treasury chief’s comments are already fueling debate about how immigration policy dovetails with the nation’s broader economic outlook.