The Trump administration just issued a draft rule that would prevent illegal immigrants from claiming federal housing subsidies. The reform will help ensure that taxpayer dollars only go to needy American families.

Though welcome and much needed, the rule doesn’t address the root of the problem — the widespread lack of affordable housing in this country. More than 10 million Americans depend on federal welfare programs to pay rent. Tens of millions more qualify for such assistance but don’t receive any help due to programs’ budget constraints.

America’s immigration laws deserve part of the blame for this sorry state of affairs. Today, 45 million immigrants reside in the United States. Over the coming half-century, immigration will account for nearly 90% of U.S. population growth, according to Pew Research.

This year, the federal government will let in 1 million legal immigrants and hundreds of thousands of temporary guest workers. If current trends hold, another 1 million foreigners will illegally immigrate to our country. And that’s just in 2019.

Just like everyone else, immigrants need places to live. Their demand for a limited supply of apartments and houses drives up rents, especially in metropolitan areas where immigrants tend to concentrate. Curbing immigration levels would do more than any welfare program to ensure that working-class Americans can afford the roofs over their heads.

Take the Bay Area, for example. Immigrants account for roughly 36% of the population. The average home was valued around $1.34 million last year. San Francisco’s housing prices have risen so rapidly that one U.N. official called it a “human rights violation.”

In Los Angeles, where immigrants make up 35% of the population, home values shot up 50% in the past five years. Nine in ten homes are now unaffordable to the average L.A. resident.

Mass immigration drives up housing costs abroad, too. Former Vancouver Mayor Art Phillips, meanwhile, blames decades of lax immigration laws for Vancouver’s housing crisis. This city ranks among the top three most unaffordable cities in the English-speaking world. “The primary approach to solving the housing problem in the Greater Vancouver area lies in the immediate reduction and future control of immigration,” says Phillips.

For middle-class people, higher rents are an inconvenience — it means less disposable income.

But for working-class Americans who are barely scraping by, higher rents could mean eviction, leaving them with few options. The United States is short nearly 4 million affordable rental units, according to a report by the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

This means that for every 100 impoverished households, there are only 35 units available that cost less than 30% of the households’ income.

In some states, the situation has grown especially dire.

Nevada recently experienced an economic boom that attracted a substantial number of new immigrants in search of work. But the housing market couldn’t keep up with this population growth. For every 100 low-income households, only 15 affordable units exist.

In Texas, which has witnessed rapid growth in its immigrant population over the past couple of decades, 70% of low-income households spend over half of their income on housing. Houston suffers from a shortfall of 626,000 housing units for low-income families, one of the worst in the nation. Overall, there are only 18 affordable units per 100 households.

Skyrocketing housing costs threaten these Americans’ well-being. Roughly 20% of Americans cut back on health care and even food spending just to meet their monthly payments.

It’s time for our leaders to relieve these Americans’ plight by reducing immigration-fueled population growth. Requiring companies to verify that all employees are in the country legally would discourage illegal immigrants from coming in the first place, since they would no longer be able to find jobs. Limiting recent immigrants’ ability to sponsor their non-nuclear family members for green cards would likewise reduce population growth.

For tens of millions of Americans, the rent is too high. Changing our immigration laws would bring it down.