Explainer: Immigrants and Crime in the United States – United States of America

Immigrants in the United States are less likely to commit crimes than the U.S.-born population, despite critics’ claims that immigration is linked to higher crime rates. This reality of reduced crime, which applies to all immigrant groups, including illegal immigrants, has been demonstrated through research and findings for the only state in the United States – Texas – that tracks arrests and convictions of criminals by immigration status.

A growing body of research shows that immigrants not only commit fewer crimes, but also do not increase crime rates in the U.S. communities where they settle. In fact, some studies suggest that immigration can reduce criminal activity, particularly violent crime, in places with inclusive policies and social environments where immigrant populations are well established.

A look at the entire immigrant population

National studies have examined incarceration rates and prosecutions of immigrants in the country and have overwhelmingly found that immigrants of all legal statuses are less likely to commit crimes than those born in the United States.

Immigrants are prosecuted and incarcerated with lower penalties than U.S.-born immigrants

Immigrants in the United States have had lower incarceration rates than the native-born population since at least 1870 (when such data were first collected). In 2020 there were immigrants 60 percent less likely to be incarcerated according to a study by the National Bureau of Economic Research.

And although a 2021 Justice Department study indicates that immigration prosecutions increased between 1990 and 2018, Almost 90 percent involved violations of immigration laws. Notably, U.S.-born citizens were ten times more likely than immigrants to be incarcerated for gun crimes, five times more likely for violent crimes, more than twice as likely for property crimes, and almost twice as likely for drug crimes.

At the state level, several studies have found that there is no clear connection between violent crime and immigration. And city-level research suggests that increases in immigration may be linked to falling homicide rates, with the greatest impacts seen in communities with long histories of immigration, as well as declines in property crimes and robberies. As a result, immigrants are less likely to become either criminals or victims of crime at the local level than the U.S.-born population.

Unauthorized immigrants and crime

While being present in the United States without authorization is an administrative offense (punishable by deportation), illegal immigrants are less likely to commit misdemeanors and felonies than U.S.-born populations and other immigrant groups.

A Unique Data Snapshot: Immigrants and Crime in Texas

Texas represents a unique laboratory for studying immigrants and crime because it is the only state that tracks arrests and convictions of criminals by immigration status. A 2020 federal study based on data from the Texas Department of Public Safety found that immigrants of all legal statuses were arrested in the following locations:

• Less than half the rate of US-born citizens for violent and drug crimes
• A quarter of the rate of those born in the US due to property crimes

Reports on overall crime rates in border states and many inner cities that have recently received large numbers of new arrivals from the U.S.-Mexico border also show an overall year-over-year decline in criminal activity. However, further research is needed to understand whether these trends follow the same patterns as those reported in existing studies.

Lower crime rates in communities with more illegal immigrants

Some research suggests so Illegal immigrants are less likely to commit crimes because they are aware of a “constant threat of deportation” and have more to lose than other groups if they break the law. This, in turn, can lead to lower crime rates in US communities, studies show:

Screening and screening migrants for security threats

Since September 11, the U.S. government has made significant investments in screening and vetting migrants arriving at U.S. borders. And more recently, the United States has increased its investment and cooperation with other countries in the Western Hemisphere to identify earlier and better who is trying to reach the U.S.-Mexico border. Increased information sharing across America and intensified law enforcement, terrorist surveillance, and intelligence review at U.S. borders continue to improve to reduce security threats, despite existing restrictions on access to criminal databases from some migrants’ countries of origin. Although the screening and review process is imperfect, it is becoming more thorough and comprehensive. And not a single American has been killed in a terrorist attack on U.S. soil carried out by an immigrant who entered illegally through a land or water border, the Cato Institute reported.

Periods of high border arrivals are straining existing capacity and infrastructure, but the Border Patrol is conducting necessary security screening and screening procedures for individuals encountered illegally entering the United States, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Inspector General noted. And in cases where migrants do not have government-issued identification, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers may accept self-reported biographical information to conduct records checks, background checks, and a Conduct a comprehensive risk classification assessment of an individual’s threat to national security before making a decision to detain or release.

In many cases, the security clearance and vetting process begins hundreds of miles south of the U.S.-Mexico border. For example, as part of their “controlled flow” policies, Costa Rican and Panamanian authorities monitor migrants traveling north through their countries and collect biometric information (e.g. fingerprints and retinal scans) of suspected individuals to connect them with international and U.S -Compare American security databases. These immigration authorities share the results with the U.S. government, which conducts a check against security databases and returns information about whether a person has a criminal background or is a fugitive or a known or suspected terrorist. Authorities in Costa Rica and Panama may detain and deport individuals deemed to be potential security threats.

resources

• National Bureau of Economic Research, Law-Being Immigrants: The Incarceration Gap Between Immigrants and the US-born, 1870-2020, March 2024
• Proceedings of the National Academy of Social Sciences Comparing Crime Rates Among Undocumented Immigrants, Legal Immigrants, and Native-born U.S. Citizens in Texas, December 2020
• Brennan Center for Justice, Debunking the Myth of the “Migrant Crime Wave,” May 2024.
• The Marshall Project: Is There a Connection Between Undocumented Immigrants and Crime?, May 2019
• Criminology: Does Undocumented Immigration Increase Violent Crime?, May 2017
• CATO Institute, Illegal Immigrant Murderers in Texas, 2013-2022, June 2024