In the wake of Zohran Mamdani‘s stunning win in the New York City Democratic mayoral primary, Hill Republicans are pondering a new issue – restricting legal immigration.This debate highlights a growing concern within the party about the potential impact of demographic shifts on American culture and politics.

Several conservatives have used Mamdani’s primary victory to argue that mass immigration is causing damaging cultural change, pointing to the 33-year-old’s political rise as an example. Mamdani, a Democratic socialist, was born in Uganda. A win in the general election would make him the first Muslim and Indian mayor of New York city.

“We have fifty-one-and-a-half million foreign born people in this country,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) told reporters. “You clamp down on illegal immigration, which is what the president is doing, but you need to limit, slash and refocus legal immigration… legal immigration is part of the problem.” This statement reflects a broader sentiment among some Republicans who believe current immigration levels are unsustainable and detrimental to national identity.

While the overall number of immigrants is the highest ever, its not a record as a percentage of the U.S. population.The key difference now is the geographic origin of immigrants. Historically, mass immigration primarily came from Europe. Now, immigration is