Final answer:
The claim is false; the second wave of immigrants to the U.S. were mainly white ethnic Europeans from southern and eastern Europe, not English speaking countries in Southeastern Europe and Asia. They faced significant challenges such as discrimination and took on low-paying, physically demanding jobs.
Step-by-step explanation:
The statement that the second wave of immigrants were mostly from English speaking countries in Southeastern Europe and Asia is false. The second and third waves of immigration to the United States, which occurred from the early nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth century, were primarily composed of white ethnic Europeans from southern and eastern Europe. These immigrants, many of whom were peasant farmers, faced 'push' factors like famines, religious, political, or racial persecution, and compulsory military service. On arrival, they sought wage-earning work and were subjected to discrimination and prejudice, with many living in segregated, urban slums doing physically demanding jobs. The late nineteenth-century southern and eastern European immigrants, in contrast to their western and northern European counterparts, generally had fewer resources and faced harsher conditions in America.