More than 800,000 people from Muslim majority countries have gotten green cards since 2009, wth the number set to hit 1 million before President Obama leaves office.

The data, released by a Senate subcommittee on immigration and the national interest, reflect a steady uptick in migration from Muslim nations in recent years – even as Donald Trump seeks to put a pause on Muslims visiting the United States.

The biggest increase in permanent residents came from Pakistan and Iraq, with more than 100,000 coming from each country. Bangledesh had 90,000, Iran had 85,000, and Egypt had 56,000, while Somalia had 37,000, according to data published by Breitbart News.



The Pew Research Center estimated there are about 3.3 million Muslims living in the U.S., making up about 1 per cent of the population. This number is expected to double by 2050, when it would be 2.1 per cent of the population.

The figures don't cover those entering the country on short-term visas like tourist visas.

Donald Trump is calling for a Muslim ban for countries with a 'proven history' of terrorism, though it's not clear if he means to target regimes or countries where terror has occured

If the Trump ban were enacted, it could reduce immigrants from Muslim nations by up to a third. Pakistan is a global hot spot for terrorism and is where the U.S. located and killed Osama Bin Laden, although the government there has allowed the U.S. to carry out drone strikes against terrorists in its territory.

The regime in Tehran is considered a top sponsor of terrorism, although historically many Iranian immigrants to the U.S. have been regime opponents. The Muslim Brotherhood was briefly in charge Egypt after the overthrow of Hosni Mubarack, and ISIS has been active in the Sinai peninsula.

Trump said Monday after a fanatic born here to parents from Afghanistan killed 49 people at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando that he wants to 'suspend immigration from areas of the world where there's a proven history of terrorism against the United States, Europe, or our allies.'

He didn't say how he would define the countries that would come under the suspension, or whether he meant countries that had suffered attacks or those considered to either support or turn a blind eye to terrorism.

832,014 immigrants from Muslim majority countries have gotten green cards since 2009

President Obama announces executive actions on immigration to ease deportation threats for undocumented immigrants in 2014

He has said the ban would stay in place 'until we figure out what is going on.'

Donald Verrilli, the outgoing U.S. solicitor general said Trump's Muslim ban wouldn't be upheld in by the Supreme Court even if it got enacted.

'Yeah. I mean, I don't want to speculate on a case that doesn't exist and probably will never exist. But I can't imagine that the Court would find a religious test like that appropriate,' Verrilli told MSNBC in an interview as he prepares to step down from his job.

Immigration from Muslim-majority countries has increased year-over-year.

Muslim men pray at a demonstration in front of the Immigration and Naturalization Services building in New York in 2002

According to the Senate subcommittee, the number of green cards going to Muslim-majority countries jumped by 27 per cent from 2013 to 2014, to 149,000 from 117,000.

The trend puts the U.S. on track to grant green cards to 1.1. migrants from Muslim-majority countries.

President Obama called for the U.S. to admit 10,000 refugees into the U.S. because of the civil war there. But as of March, only about 1,300 Syrian refugees had been admitted.

Trump's proposed Muslim ban had been drawing criticism among elected Republicans. House Speaker Paul Ryan continued to criticize the proposal this week, and said that 'I would sue any president that exceeds his or her powers.'

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services presented 2,354 candidates for naturalization at a federal court in in Boston on June 16

A dinghy overloaded with Afghan immigrants arrives on a beach in Greece in May, 2015



