Immigration And Crime Report

Not only do some Americans believe that immigrants take jobs away from Americans, but they also believe that immigrants bring crime to America. President Donald Trump has made numerous remarks about immigration and crime, suggesting that the two are linked. However when the amount of immigrants living in America, both documented and undocumented, increased sharply between the years of 1990 and 2010, the United States violent crime rate plummeted by 45% and the property crime rate declined by

Illegal immigrants have been a hot topic lately due to the popularity of this topic amongst the Republican Presidential Nominees, especially Donald Trump. These illegal immigrants bring various things to this country when they come. Some things are positive, such as a family simply seeking to find a better life, while some things are harmful to the United States, such as the amount of crime among illegal immigrants. In July 2015, the most recent estimate of illegal immigrants was 11.2 million. This same data shoes that 56 percent of all deportations last year were convicted criminals, which accounted for 177,960 individuals (Shoichet, 2015). Crime among illegal immigrants is a problem, and sanctuary cities, which are supposed to be a solution, may be making this problem worse.

Immigration is one of the central themes of the founding of the United States and as such it is often the epicenter of controversy among both citizens and policymakers. Throughout the twentieth century, American citizens and policymakers have brought to the forefront the importance of immigration and the role immigrants play within society. This can be a cause of friction between immigrants and multi-generational citizens because immigrants are often viewed with a negative connotation. They are often blamed for stealing jobs from hardworking citizens, draining the healthcare system and adding to the homeless population. They are associated with crime, poverty and in general they are perceived as undesirable members of society (Spenkuch, 2014). The relationship between crime and immigrants is of particular importance because there is a common perception that immigrants cause crime and their neighborhoods are riddled with criminal activity. Also important to note is that the characteristics of immigrants tend to coincide with members of the native-born population that are disproportionally incarceration. In general, they are poorly educated, earn low wages and are young, males. This led to the perception that incoming immigrants continuously add to the lower class, criminal population. In order to clearly understand the relationship between the two concepts they must be examined both from a theoretical and empirical viewpoint

A couple of facts that counters the image of illegal immigrants as criminals include, “The anti-immigrant forces draw, for example, on the ‘2006 (first quarter) INS [immigration and Naturalization service/FBI statistical report on undocumented Immigrants’ with its array of alarming statistics about illegal immigrants and crime to make their case that undocumented immigrants not only break the law entering the country but also break the laws, with a proclivity to violent crimes, once they make their homes here.” And, “One of the most disturbing findings of the IPC study was that immigrant children and immigrants with many years in the country are more likely to become criminals than first-generation immigrants or those with less than 15

Disputes has sparked between the correlation of citizens and crime due to the statement made by President Donald J. Trump. There has been a bias belief that immigrants have came to America and have consumed all the jobs and create a terror in society. There is a negative bias towards the immigrants due to the severity of crimes committed. Due to the negative bias, immigrants are deemed to increase the danger to national security and public safety. There is a large disparity between the total number of immigrants compared to citizens so crime rates are used to compare.

The author focuses on Hispanic/Latino immigrants and the views on immigrants who commit crime. In this study, the author’s findings come from the public perceptions. The perceptions of the public in local communities, towns, and cities, discriminate due to the increase in Hispanic/Latino immigration. The public’s view in the study were discriminative against Hispanics/Latinos who migrated to the United States. Sohoni found that societies perceptions in surveys propose a great quantity of Americans that consider immigration will indicate abnormal criminality. On the contrary, the author found that immigrant Hispanic/Latino youths were less likely than Hispanic U.S. Americans to participate in crime.

The presence of Hispanic-owned businesses was found to decrease the new immigration–property crime relationship. The importance of business presence could be a result of the economic neighborhood recovery that results from the immigrant-owned businesses. Immigration is reviving and stabilizing local communities by increasing the income base of communities. The recovery of these communities will experience a decline in criminal outcomes, not just among the immigrant population, but also among all population groups. Also, there will be an increase in jobs to aid the needs of the expanding population. Low-crime areas attract Hispanic business owners as much as business activity causes a decrease in levels of crime. As Hispanic-owned businesses increase, new immigrants are more likely to follow to these positions. Findings show that first-generation immigrants are least likely to commit violent crimes. The third-generation immigrants are most likely the generation to commit acts of crime. Minority and immigrant-owned businesses may be an important part of the debate of the local economy and crime. This research is important for public policy. The United States visa policies are preventing entrepreneurs from innovation and job creation within the United States that would also create an opportunity for United States citizens.

What role will immigrants have in the future of American crime? Unlike the past and the present, it is difficult to determine exactly what sort of role immigrants will play in the future. According to the U.S. Census Bureau (2010) “The next half century marks key points in continuing trends — the U.S. will become a plurality nation, where the non-Hispanic white population remains the largest single group, but no group is in the majority” (p. 11). Estolano LeSar Perez, a researcher with Los Angeles 2050, says this could have a real impact on something that preoccupies many Americans: crime.

Lee, Matthew T. (2003). Crime on the Border: Immigration and Homicide in Urban Communities. New York: LFB Scholarly Publishing.

According to several studies, there is no correlation present between the immigrants and the cities they live in. One graph shows the most dangerous cities in the United States based on violent crimes committed per 100,000 residents. It says that Detroit, Michigan is the most violent city with 2,123 violent crimes per 100,000 residents and St.Louis, Missouri in third place with 1,777 violent crimes per 100,000 residents ("The 10 Most Dangerous U.S. Cities"). Another table shows the list and percentages of the metropolitans with the highest amount of foreign borns in their population. Miami has the largest share of immigrants at 38.5% and San Jose is a close runner up with 36.8% foreign born residents. (Florida). Comparing the two data, the cities from the dangerous city graph were absent in the high foreign born table. In fact, another table, which showed the metropolitans with the least foreign born born populations, included the names of four cities from the violent crime graph e.g. St.Louis, Missouri and Memphis, Tennessee. With the clear absence of the dangerous city names, no relationship is shown between crime rates and immigrants. Not only that, but these foreigners do not have much incentive to commit crimes. A study shows that “first-generation immigrants [are] 45 percent less likely to commit violence than third-generation Americans"

Although events such as San Bernardino in 2015 provide anecdotal evidence of immigrants committing acts of extreme violence, these events are extremely rare. Nonetheless, tragedies such as these inevitably grab headlines and capture the attention of millions of Americans across the country. Tragedies such as the attack in San Bernardino hold strong emotional appeal to proponents for restrictive immigration policy. However, these rare and uncontrollable events should not provide the base of logic for America’s national immigration policy as they are not a proxy for immigrant behavior as a whole. Various statistics regarding crime among immigrants may reveal an underlying reason for lower crime rates, which is that the majority of immigrants understand the implications of committing a crime and know that it would not be in their best interest as a new member of the country they wish to call home. Natives, moreover, have crime rates five times that of immigrants. This demonstrates the potential positive externalities that immigrants contribute to the social sphere by lowering the crime rate and acting as models within urban America.

Research suggests that legal immigrants commit less crime than native-born citizens, but despite this evidence there are discrepancies in how the criminal justice system punishes both groups, leaving legal immigrants to be punished more severely than native-born citizens. Many believe that legal immigrants, particularly minority groups, are not only a threat to society, but they are said to increase crime in the United States (Wang, 2012). Research by D. Sohoni and T. Sohoni (2013) revealed that, “nativist discourses also present certain immigrants as a threat to American society. This threat is both cultural, because of their (presumed) unwillingness or inability to assimilate, and social, because of their (presumed) displacement of American workers, and their abuse of social services and community resources” (p. 50). Due to this negative perception of immigrants, they are viewed as “aliens,” “immoral,” and “outsiders” who do not belong in the US (D. Sohoni & T. Sohoni, 2013). Immigrants have been fighting not only a war with society’s negative views of them, but also the power those perceptions play on their ability to gain upward mobility and succeed in the US and their ability to receive fair punishment when they commit offenses. Therefore, many are left unable to adjust to societal norms and are not given fair treatment by different community resources or the criminal justice system.

It is proven that immigrants are far more afraid and less likely to as well participate in any crime involved activities, quit their jobs, shoplift, hurt others in any way, shape or form, or do something that could get them arrested. It’s the sense of fear they have for getting deported, but it may also be that good spirit in which they truly came here to start a better life with no problems. Many comparisons between cities, communities and counties are done by economists to differentiate the links of local concentration of immigrants and the rates of crime and violence in that specified area. Results showed that the higher number concentration of immigrants, the lower crime rate. There is no proven connection found between immigrants and higher crime

A quarter of the inmates in federal prisons are aliens. In a study comparing high immigration cities to low immigration cities, the high immigration cities were found to have twice as much violent crime as low immigration cities. Not only does immigration contribute to the poverty that causes crime, but also many aliens have criminal careers.

The thought of arriving immigrants in any host country has been accompanied by reactions of exclusion, and continues to expand throughout the years. During any social illness, immigrants tend to be the first to be held responsible by their recipient societies. Most crimes are associated with immigrants due to the fact that they may not posses the same socio-economics status as natives. Another contributing factor is the media that conducts numerous stories that highlight the image of immigrant crimes to recall the alleged difference between native and foreign born. Undoubtedly, the correlation between immigration and crime has become one of the most controversial discussions in current society. As we enter a new era, immigrants will have