New immigrants to the US are avoiding the traditional destinations, says a “new” study:

New immigrants who once flocked to the large “gateway” cities of Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, and Chicago are now heading for smaller metropolitan areas like Detroit and Minneapolis, Colorado Springs, Colo., Sarasota, Fla., and El Paso, Tex., according to the the study, released by the Lusk Center for Real Estate at the University of Southen California. The census data used for the study didn’t take into account respondents’ legal status.

“Every city in the US is getting a sizable immigration population,” said Gary Painter, director of research at the Lusk Center and co-author of the study, in a phone interview. “We are no longer a country where immigration is largely confined to just a few places.”

The study, in and of itself, is a bit of a political football – or at least, interpreting it seems to be:

The typical immigrant seen in these new places is likely to have been in the US fewer than 10 years, he says, whereas the typical immigrant in a larger city has likely been here much longer. The implication of this is that new immigrants probably have less English language skills, are less likely to be integrated, and are less likely to own a home.

“We found that the immigrant communities in these smaller metro areas are much less developed,” Mr. Painter said. “The questions we need to ask ourselves are ‘what sorts of policies do we want to pursue because of this?’ ”

Which, one might suspect, might be a result of them being newer immigrants.

And yes, the politicians are getting out their knives to carve out their respective bits of grievance:

“Given the negative attitudes towards immigrants, the incessant persecution by immigration agents, and the lack of jobs,” says Jorge-Mario Cabrera of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles, “immigrants may believe that smaller cities offer all the right options: a place to live unnoticed, a somewhat welcoming environment, and less competition for lower-paying jobs.”

Still others question whether it’s too soon to draw too many conclusions because of the heated political climate, the recent downturn in the economy, and the coming 2010 census.

“This study is only looking at home ownership and may be overtaken by the next census,” says Karthick Ramakrishnan, who studies immigration patterns and demographics at the University of California, Riverside. “There are many variables that need to be examined because of the push and pull over immigrants – some declaring that they drag the economy down and others saying it props them up.”

The thing is, this isn’t really news.  We reported on the demographic trend almost three years ago, here at SITD.  Leaving aside the immigrants who come to America to escape crime, pettifoggery, warlordism and the rule of mens’ whims (wouldn’t moving to Chicago be redundant if you were from Sarajevo or Mogadishu?), immigrants aren’t stupid.  Lower crime, more jobs and better taxes draw them as they do all the rest of us.