A new report from the Center for Immigration Studies says the recession has hit immigrants harder.

Nationally, 9.7 percent of immigrants are unemployed, according to the report titled "'Trends in Immigrant and Native Employment." That's about one percent higher than the general unemployment rate.

The report says the number of unemployed immigrants increased by 130 percent since 2007. The increase among Americans was 81 percent.

Andrew Behnke, an assistant professor at North Carolina State University who works with programs for immigrants across the state, says he sees the trend locally.

"We're seeing a lot of families being laid off from factories, especially our undocumented families losing their jobs because they are the lowest on the totem pole, the easiest to fire," he said.

Immigrants are particularly affected because they tend to work in industries hit hard by the recession, including construction, the report says.

Some immigrants are moving to other states or returning to their home counties, Behnke says.

"There's always a flow back and forth. But there have been families that I see out of work that are returning for that reason," he said.

Others are staying put and surviving with help from friends.

"Here I know a lot of people, they can give me a job easily," said Jose Gallegos, a Honduran immigrant who is unemployed for the first time since he came to the U.S. 15 years ago. "If I move somewhere else, I don't know anybody over there and they don't know me either."