IMMIGRATION
AND PUBLIC SAFETY

For more information, contact:
The Sentencing Project
1705 DeSales Street NW
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(202) 628-0871
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This report was written by Nazgol Ghandnoosh, Ph.D., Research
Analyst, and Josh Rovner, Juvenile Justice Advocacy Associate, at
The Sentencing Project. Casey Anderson and Jessica Yoo, Program
Associates at The Sentencing Project, provided research assistance.
The Sentencing Project is a national non-profit organization engaged
in research and advocacy on criminal justice issues. Our work is
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Copyright © 2017 by The Sentencing Project. Reproduction of this
document in full or in part, and in print or electronic format, only by
permission of The Sentencing Project.

2 The Sentencing Project

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Executive Summary		

3

I. Immigrants Commit Crimes at Lower Rates than Native-Born Citizens	

6

II. Higher Levels of Immigration May Have Contributed to the Historic Drop in Crime Rates	

8

III. Police Chiefs Believe Intensifying Immigration Law Enforcement Undermines 	
Public Safety	

10

IV. Immigrants are Under-Represented in U.S. Prisons 	

12

V. Conclusion	

14

Immigration and Public Safety 3

4 The Sentencing Project

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Foreign-born residents of the United States commit crime less often than nativeborn citizens. Policies that further restrict immigration are therefore not effective
crime-control strategies. These facts—supported by over 100 years of research—
have been misrepresented both historically and in recent political debates.
Starting from his first day as a candidate, President Donald
Trump has made demonstrably false claims associating
immigrants with criminality.1 As president, he has sought to
justify restrictive immigration policies, such as increasing
detentions and deportations and building a southern border
wall, as public safety measures.2 He has also linked immigrants
with crime through an Executive Order directing the Attorney
General to establish a task force to assist in “developing strategies
to reduce crime, including, in particular, illegal immigration,
drug trafficking, and violent crime,”3 and by directing the
Department of Homeland Security to create an office to assist
and publicize victims of crimes committed by immigrants.4

A rigorous body of research supports the following conclusions
about the recent impact of immigrants in the United States:
1.	 Immigrants commit crimes at lower rates than nativeborn citizens.
2.	 Higher levels of immigration in recent decades may
have contributed to the historic drop in crime rates.
3.	 Police chiefs believe that intensifying immigration law
enforcement undermines public safety.
4.	 Immigrants are under-represented in U.S. prisons.

By surveying key research on immigration and crime, this report
seeks to enable the public and policymakers to engage in a more
meaningful policy debate rooted in facts. Immigrants’ impact
on public safety is a well-examined field of study.

Photo by Casey Anderson

Immigration and Public Safety 5

I. IMMIGRANTS COMMIT CRIMES
AT LOWER RATES THAN NATIVEBORN CITIZENS
“Research dating back more than a century documents a pattern
whereby the foreign-born are involved in crime at significantly
lower rates than their peers,” note Bianca  Bersani and
Alex Piquero, a sociologist at the University of MassachusettsBoston and a criminologist at the University of Texas,
respectively.5 These scholars contribute to a vast body of research
demonstrating that popular fears about immigration and crime
have been unfounded.
Foreign-born individuals (“first-generation immigrants”) report
lower rates of criminal offending than native-born citizens and
they have less contact with the criminal justice system, as
measured by arrest records. Indeed, two notable studies,
highlighted in a report by the American Immigration Council,
find:6
•	

•	

Foreign-born individuals are less likely than native-born
individuals to have engaged in violent or non-violent
antisocial behaviors in their lifetimes, including harassment,
assault, and acquiring multiple traffic violations, “despite
being more likely to have lower levels of income, less
education, and reside in urban areas.”7 The study’s authors
add that these findings hold for immigrants from major
world regions including Africa, Asia, Europe, and Latin
America. Their analysis drew on survey data from a nationally
representative sample of over 40,000 U.S. residents aged
18 years and older.
Foreign-born youth enrolled in U.S. middle and high schools
in the mid-1990s had among the lowest delinquency rates
when compared to their peers.8 These researchers focused
on non-violent delinquent acts such as stealing, damaging
property, or selling drugs. Their study drew on repeated
surveys of over 20,000 adolescents conducted between 1994
through 2002.

6 The Sentencing Project

When studies like these measure crime and related behavior
based on self-reported accounts of behavior, they avoid biases
caused by criminal justice enforcement decisions and policies.9
Importantly, Bersani and Piquero have shown that self-reported
behavior can be reliably used to measure disparities in criminal
behavior. Their comparison of self-reported crime data with
official arrest records for 1,300 adolescents across seven years
concluded that foreign-born individuals reported their arrests
as accurately as their native-born counterparts.10 Therefore, “The
finding that the foreign-born commit less crime than their U.S.born peers is not a product of differences in reporting practices
across these groups.”11

Immigrants — regardless of legal
status — do not have higher crime
rates than native-born citizens.
In fact, the prevalence of foreign-born individuals among the
Latino population helps to explain differences in violent crime
rates between whites and Latinos. Harvard University sociologist
Robert Sampson and colleagues have found that “the lower rate
of violence among Mexican Americans compared with Whites
was explained by a combination of married parents, living in a
neighborhood with a high concentration of immigrants, and
individual immigrant status.”12 Thus all else equal, ethnic/racial
groups with a higher proportion of immigrants exhibit lower
rates of crime.
Notably, integration into American society brings immigrants’
crime rates closer to the higher levels of native-born Americans,

Figure 1. Reported Rates of Delinquent or Criminal Behavior in Previous Year
25%
Children of US-born

20%
Prevelance

Children of foreign-born

15%
10%
Foreign-born

5%
0%

12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24
Age

Source: Bersani B. E. (2014). An Examination of First and Second Generation Immigrant Offending Trajectories. Justice Quarterly
(31)2, 315–343.

as shown in Figure 1.13 This occurs because the children of
immigrants lose the cultural and social attributes that buffered
their parents from criminal offending (as described in Part 2)
and because some immigrant groups are constrained in
socioeconomically disadvantaged communities.
To what extent does the lower crime rate of foreign-born
individuals hold for those who are undocumented immigrants?
Major national datasets lack information on respondents’
immigration legal status, and this information has not been
systematically collected by law enforcement agencies or state
departments of corrections.14 But a few studies using other data
sources to differentiate by legal status have supported the
conclusion that immigrants—regardless of legal status—do not
have higher crime rates than native-born citizens. For example:
•	

A study comparing recidivism rates of individuals released
from the Los Angeles County Jail in 2002 found no difference
in the re-arrest rate of deportable and non-deportable
immigrants.15

•	

A study of recently booked adult arrestees in Maricopa
County, Arizona in 2007 and 2008, found that: “In general,
illegal immigrants and legal immigrants reported about
one-half the [drug] use when compared to U.S. citizens.”16

•	

An examination of 2010 Census data revealed that the
groups who make up the bulk of the undocumented
population—young, less-educated men born in Mexico, El
Salvador, and Guatemala—have significantly lower
incarceration rates than similarly situated native-born men.17

In addition, as described in Part 2, the growth of the foreignborn population, including those who are undocumented, has
coincided with a historic crime drop. Parts 2 and 3 show that
communities that have implemented restrictive immigration
policies have experienced little or no public safety benefit, while
those which have embraced undocumented immigrants have
sometimes outperformed the nationwide crime drop. Finally, as
described in Part 4, data from federal courts—which reveal the
legal status of sentenced immigrants—do not support a link
between undocumented status and criminality.
Immigration and Public Safety 7

II. HIGHER LEVELS OF IMMIGRATION
MAY HAVE CONTRIBUTED TO THE
HISTORIC DROP IN CRIME RATES
The influx of immigrants in recent decades has coincided with
a significant decline in reported crime rates, which may have
been influenced by the growing immigrant population. Research
has demonstrated that communities with larger immigrant
populations have outpaced the public safety gains of their peers.

2010 in 156 large cities.21 Similar findings led University of
Alabama criminologist Lesley Williams Reid and colleagues to
conclude “immigration does not increase crime rates, and some
aspects of immigration lessen crime in metropolitan areas.”22

As shown in Figure 2, in 1990 the reported violent crime rate
was 730 offenses per 100,000 residents. That same year the
number of foreign-born individuals living in the United States
was roughly 19.8 million (3.5 million of whom were
undocumented).18 The violent crime rate began to fall in the
mid-1990s and by 2014 it was half of its 1990 level, at 362
offenses per 100,000 residents. By that year, the foreign-born
population had more than doubled, reaching 42.2 million people
(including 11.1 million undocumented people).19

Immigrants help lower the crime rate
in their communities because of their
strong familial ties, their political
participation, their orientation to the
justice system, and their economic
impact.

Although not definitive in proving causation, these trends
establish a critical fact about immigrants and public safety: crime
rates have fallen to historic lows amidst the growth of the
foreign-born population. As described next, studies examining
the impact of immigrants on their adopted communities reveal
that these communities have shared in and sometimes outpaced
the nationwide crime drop.

Research has shown that crime rates have also decreased in
“gateway” cities, which are the entry point cities to the United
States and often the most densely immigrant-populated places.23
In addition, southwestern border states and cities were found
to be safer than similarly sized non-border areas in 2010.24

Robert Adelman, a sociologist at the University at Buffalo, and
his colleagues compared crime rates in 200 metropolitan areas
with varying immigrant population sizes from 1970 to 2010.
They found that cities with both large and small immigrant
populations generally saw a decline in violent crime rates after
1990. Furthermore, the rate at which homicide declined was
much greater in cities with larger immigrant populations than
in cities with smaller immigrant populations. Property crimes
also decreased faster in cities with larger immigrant populations
than in cities with smaller immigrant populations.20 This result
was echoed by Graham Ousey and Charis Kubrin, of the College
of William and Mary and University of California-Irvine,
respectively, in their review of homicide rates between 1980 and
8 The Sentencing Project

Even at the neighborhood level, communities with larger
immigrant populations have lower crime rates. One study found
that people living in Chicago neighborhoods in 2005 with at
least 40% immigrants were 80% less likely to experience violence
than people living in neighborhoods with no immigrants.25 In
addition, immigration was generally found to not affect homicide
rates of Latinos and to have mixed effects on the rate among
African Americans, according to a study that looked at the
relationship between immigration and homicide from 1985 to
1995 in Miami and San Diego, and from 1985 to 1994 in El
Paso.26
Researchers have suggested that immigrants help lower the crime
rate in their communities because of their strong familial ties,
their political participation, their orientation to the justice system,

Figure 2. Declining Violent Crime Rates Amidst Increasing Levels of Immigration, 1990-2014
50
Violent crime rate

600

40

450

30

300

20

150

10

0

1990

2000

Foreign-born citizens and
documented immigrants

2010

2014

Immigrant population in millions

Violent crime rate per 100,000 residents

750

0

Undocumented immigrants

Source: Brown, A. & Stepler, R. (2016). Statistical Portrait of the Foreign-Born Population in the United States. Pew Research Center, Hispanic Trends.
Retrieved from http://www.pewhispanic.org/2016/04/19/statistical-portrait-of-the-foreign-born-population-in-the-united-states-key-charts/#2013-fbpopulation; FBI’s Crime in the United States series. Retrieved from https://www.ucrdatatool.gov/Search/Crime/Crime.cfm

and their economic impact. Because foreign-born individuals
disproportionately live in two-parent households, their families
contribute to their community’s level of social cohesion and
organization.27 By providing greater oversight in their
communities, immigrant families and neighbors can improve
public safety. Violent crime rates also decrease when immigrants
see favorable political opportunities.28 As they gain political
representation, immigrants become further encouraged to
contribute to the civic life and collective organization in their
neighborhoods. Furthermore, immigrant youth tend to be less
cynical about the law and perceive greater social costs resulting
from involvement in the justice system compared to the nativeborn population.29 Since criminal-justice contact may also
jeopardize their immigration status, immigrants who willingly
came to the United States for safety and better opportunities
are more likely to be law-abiding than their U.S.-born
counterparts.30
Finally, the economic revitalization spurred by high immigration
settlement in cities has also helped to reduce crime rates. As
immigrants move into American communities, they increase
economic activity and thus create jobs.31 This economic boost
makes all residents less likely to engage in criminal activities.32

Figure 3. U.S. Population, 2014
Citizen: 47%
Documented: 26%
Undocumented: 26%
Native-born:
276,300,000

Foreign-born: 42,200,000
Source: Brown, A. & Stepler, R. (April, 2016). Statistical Portrait of the
Foreign-Born Population in the United States. Pew Research Center,
Hispanic Trends. Retrieved from statistical-portrait-of-the-foreign-bornpopulation-in-the-united-states; U.S. Unauthorized Immigration Population
Estimates. (November, 2016). Estimated Unauthorized Immigrant
Population, by State, 2014. Pew Research Center, Hispanic Trends.
Retrieved from http://www.pewhispanic.org/interactives/unauthorizedimmigrants/; United States Census Bureau. American Fact Finder.
Retrieved from https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/nav/jsf/pages/index.
xhtml

Immigration and Public Safety 9

III. POLICE CHIEFS BELIEVE
INTENSIFYING IMMIGRATION LAW
ENFORCEMENT UNDERMINES
PUBLIC SAFETY
Sanctuary cities—colloquially—are those jurisdictions that do
not ask people about their citizenship status or do not detain
undocumented individuals for federal immigration authorities
beyond their release date. It is important to note there are multiple
definitions of sanctuary cities because none are codified under
federal law.33 Jurisdictions cannot impede Immigration and
Customs Enforcement from gathering information on citizenship
status on those that they have arrested, but some cities and local
police have chosen to not fully enforce immigration laws.34 Some
jurisdictions also choose not to detain those suspected of being
undocumented following a 2014 federal court ruling that held
immigration detainers were not sufficient reason to keep a person
in local jail absent any other offense.35 According to President
Trump, sanctuary cities “breed crime.”36 However, evidence
refutes this claim, and major law enforcement groups and leaders
have argued that intensifying immigration enforcement interferes
with public safety goals.

“We need to build trust with the
immigrant community. The last thing
we want is for people to be afraid of
us … They won’t report crimes, or help
us in their communities if they [are]
afraid of us.”
— William Evans
Boston Police Commissioner
10 The Sentencing Project

Research on the impact of sanctuary city policies has shown
that they do not have a negative impact on crime rates. Loren
Collingwood, a political scientist at the University of CaliforniaRiverside, reviewed crime data for 55 jurisdictions before and
after implementing such policies, and found no meaningful
effect.37 Research published by the Center for American Progress
found lower rates of crime in comparable jurisdictions that
differ only on their sanctuary status.38
Jurisdictions adopt sanctuary status in part to encourage
undocumented immigrants to assist law enforcement
investigations. Fear of the police (due to fear of deportation)
would hamper such investigations. A poll of Latinos in
Southwestern California, conducted by Lake Research Partners,
supports that belief: 44% of Latinos surveyed said they would
be less likely to report being a victim of a crime for fear the
police would ask about their documented status.39 Oxford
University sociologist David Kirk and his colleagues found that
immigrants in New York City were much less likely to assist the
police if they perceived the criminal justice system as being
unfair to people like themselves.40
Police groups and leaders defend sanctuary city practices for
reasons that echo these research findings. To reduce crime, police
in cities as different as Tulsa41 and Los Angeles42 have said they
would rather work with immigrants instead of taking steps to
deport them, including asking about citizenship status. That
position has been endorsed by the Major Cities Chiefs
Association43 and is also supported by a briefing memo from
the International Association of Chiefs of Police.44 Law

enforcement leaders have explained that engaging police in
immigration enforcement work would deter crime reporting
and cooperation. Rejecting President Trump’s criticism of
sanctuary cities, Boston Police Commissioner William Evans
has stated, “We need to build trust with the immigrant
community.” He added: “The last thing we want is for people
to be afraid of us … They won’t report crimes, or help us in
their communities if they [are] afraid of us.”45
Research revealing that aggressive immigration enforcement
produces limited public safety benefit further supports the
resistance of law enforcement leaders to intensified immigration
law enforcement. Deportations and other tactics like the 287(g)
policy (which allow local jurisdictions to enforce federal
immigration statutes) have been used on immigrant communities
to combat crime, but research shows that for the most part these
methods were not effective in controlling crime. Northeastern
University sociologist Jacob Stowell and colleagues’ analysis
found that immigrant deportations did not reduce overall violent
crime rates in metropolitan areas between 1994-2004, when
controlling for other factors.46 The authors did find important
regional variation: deportations lowered aggravated assault rates
in border areas while increasing them in non-border areas. This
suggested, they noted, that “the forced removal of individuals
in non-border areas fractures the more delicate (i.e., less well
established) information and resource networks, thereby
undermining informal mechanisms of social control.”47
Likewise, a study measuring the impact of the aggressive and
well publicized 287(g) policy in Virginia’s Prince William
County—which required police to check the immigration status
of detainees whom they suspected to be undocumented in
addition to screening jail inmates—revealed that the policy’s
announcement led to a drop in aggravated assault rates, but not
other types of crimes.48 As the authors note, it is unclear how
much this outcome was attributable to changes in reporting.

Immigration and Public Safety 11

IV. IMMIGRANTS ARE UNDERREPRESENTED IN U.S. PRISONS
Non-citizens currently make up six percent of the U.S. prison
population while comprising seven percent of the total U.S.
population.49 Non-citizens are therefore slightly underrepresented
in U.S. prisons. Some immigration opponents have presented a
partial picture of the federal prison system to suggest the opposite.
As this section illustrates, non-citizens are increasingly overrepresented in federal sentencing and incarceration due to a rise
in prison sentences for immigration offenses.
Among the 1.5 million people imprisoned in state and federal
prisons, 87% are held in state institutions.50 Within state prisons,
four percent are non-citizens.51 Within federal prisons, however,
22% are non-citizens.52 According to the Bureau of Prisons,
immigration law violations were the most serious offense for
one-third of non-citizens serving federal prison sentences.53 As
explained next through an examination of federal sentences,
the increased use of imprisonment for immigration law violations
is a major driver of the over-representation of non-citizens
receiving federal sentences.
In the most recent years for which data are available, state courts
imposed 1,132,290 felony sentences (in 2005) and federal courts
imposed 71,003 sentences (in 2015).54 In 2015, 29% of federal
sentences were for immigration offenses. It is important to note
that the total number of federal immigration sentences has
doubled between 2000 and 2015, increasing from 11,403 to
20,757, during a period in which sentences for other crimes
increased by just seven percent.55 In its analysis of federal criminal
cases in 2015, the Unites States Sentencing Commission noted
that 82% of immigration cases involved “unlawful reentry into
the United States or unlawfully remaining in the United States
without authority” and another 12% involved transporting
undocumented people across the border.56
While non-U.S. citizens received a substantial share (42%) of
all federal sentences in 2015, most of these sentences (66%)

12 The Sentencing Project

were for immigration law violations.57 Congressional proposals
endorsed by the Trump administration would further increase
penalties and create mandatory minimum sentences for illegal
re-entry into the United States.58 If passed, the new sentences
would significantly increase the number of non-citizens serving
prison sentences for immigration offenses.

Figure 4. U.S. State and Federal Prison
Populations by Citizenship
1,167,090
U.S. Citizen
Non-citizen

4%

188,777

State

22%

Federal

Note: State numbers are from December 2015 and federal numbers are
from December 2016. States that did not not report citizenship data
(Alaska, California, Nevada, and Oregon) are omitted.
Source: Carson, E. A. & Anderson, E. (2016). Prisoners in 2015. United
States Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics. Retrieved from
https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/p15.pdf; Federal Bureau of Prisons.
(2017). Inmate Citizenship. Retrieved from https://www.bop.gov/about/
statistics/statistics_inmate_citizenship.jsp

Figure 5. Federal Criminal Sentences for Non-Citizens by Offense, 2015
Immigration law: 66%
Drug: 24%

Other non-violent: 8%
Violent: 2%

Total: 29,166 sentences

Note: Violent offenses were defined based on the United States Sentencing Commission’s Supplement to the 2015 Manual Guide: murder, manslaughter,
assault, kidnapping/hostage taking, sex offense, robbery, arson, racketeering/extortion, and firearm offenses. Retrieved from http://www.ussc.gov/sites/
default/files/pdf/guidelines-manual/2015/GLMSupplement.pdf
Source: United States Sentencing Commission. 2015 Sourcebook of Federal Sentencing Statistics. Table 9: Citizenship of Offenders in Each Primary Offense
Category. Retrieved from http://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/research-and-publications/annual-reports-and-sourcebooks/2015/Table09.pdf

After immigration law violations, drug convictions were the
next largest category of federal offenses of which non-citizens
were sentenced (24%).59 In contrast, drug offenses accounted
for 38% of federal sentences for U.S. citizens.
Undocumented immigrants who receive federal criminal
sentences are even more likely to be convicted of an immigration
law violation as their most serious offense. Nearly three-quarters
(73%) of the 25,670 undocumented immigrants sentenced in
federal criminal courts in 2015 were convicted of an immigration
offense.60 In addition, in that year:
•	

Twenty percent of undocumented immigrants who received
federal sentences were convicted of drug offenses (5,218
sentences). As noted above, drug offenses accounted for
38% of federal sentences for U.S. citizens.

•	

Six undocumented immigrants received federal sentences
for murder and manslaughter. This comprised .02% of
federal sentences for this group (in contrast to .3% for U.S.
citizens). Seen another way, undocumented individuals
accounted for 4% of the 143 federal sentences for these
offenses. U.S. citizens, in contrast, received 88% of these
sentences (126 sentences).

U.S. District Judge Dan Polster has reflected on these outcomes
based on his first-hand experience serving as a visiting judge in
New Mexico. He noted that of the 200 undocumented immigrants
he sentenced, none were convicted of murder, rape, or terrorism.
He added: “These are just people who want to be with their
family or support their family.”61

Immigration and Public Safety 13

V. CONCLUSION
Before and after his election, Donald Trump has raised concerns
about increasing crime and immigration in the United States.
Indeed, he has signed an executive order and made regular
statements alleging that curbs to unauthorized immigration and
dismantling sanctuary cities would reduce U.S. crime rates. The
evidence presented here concludes otherwise.

contribute to unfounded public fears that threaten the safety of
immigrants and U.S. citizens. Improving public safety is a
complicated question that cannot be addressed by scapegoating
foreign-born residents but rather by investing in effective
community-based solutions that address the true causes of
crime.

A century of research has shown immigrants do not threaten
public safety and, in fact, are less likely to commit crime than
native-born citizens. False statements about immigrant criminality

Photographs of immigrants at Ellis Island taken by Augustus Sherman. Some of these photos were published in National Geographic in 1907 and were
displayed for decades in the lower Manhattan headquarters of the federal Immigration Service. Sherman, an amateur photographer, was Ellis Island’s
Chief Registry Clerk. The immigrants were likely detainees waiting for what they needed to leave the island (such as an escort, or money, or travel tickets).
Retrieved from the New York Public Library at https://www.flickr.com/photos/nypl/sets/72157610968916254.

14 The Sentencing Project

ENDNOTES
1	 Washington Post Staff (June 16, 2015). Full text: Donald Trump
Announces a Presidential Bid. The Washington Post. Retrieved
from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/
wp/2015/06/16/full-text-donald-trump-announces-apresidential-bid/?utm_term=.959da7b7c50f
2	 The Department of Homeland Security. (February 21, 2017).
Executive Orders on Protecting the Homeland. The
Department of Homeland Security. Retrieved from https://
www.dhs.gov/executive-orders-protecting-homeland; Bains, C.
(February 28, 2017). How Immigrants Make Communities
Safer. The Marshall Project. Retrieved from https://www.
themarshallproject.org/2017/02/28/how-immigrants-makecommunities-safer?utm_medium=social&utm_
campaign=sprout&utm_source=twitter#.c52oRzNvr
3	 The White House. (February 9, 2017). Presidential Executive
Order on a Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety.
The White House. Retrieved from https://www.whitehouse.
gov/the-press-office/2017/02/09/presidential-executive-ordertask-force-crime-reduction-and-public
4	 Wang, C. (February 28, 2017). Trump Calls for New
Government Agency for ‘Victims of Crime’ by Immigrants.
CNBC. Retrieved from http://www.cnbc.com/2017/02/28/
trump-calls-for-new-government-agency-for-victims-of-crimeby-immigrants.html
5	 Bersani, B.E. & Piquero, A.R. (2016). Examining Systematic
Crime Reporting Bias Across Three Immigrant Generations:
Prevalence, Trends, and Divergence in Self-Reported and
Official Reported Arrests. Journal of Quantitative Criminology,
1-23.
6	 Ewing, W.A., Martinez, D.E. & Rumbaut, R.G. (2015). The
Criminalization of Immigration in the United States. American
Immigration Council (AIC). Retrieved from https://www.
americanimmigrationcouncil.org/sites/default/files/research/
the_criminalization_of_immigration_in_the_united_states.pdf
7	 Vaughn, M.G., Salas-Wright, C.P., DeLisi, M. & Maynard, B.R.
(2014). The Immigrant Paradox: Immigrants are Less Antisocial
than Native-Born Americans. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric
Epidemiology (49)7, 1135. Page 1129.
8	 Powell, D., Perreira, K.M., & Mullan Harris, K. (June 2010).
Trajectories of Delinquency From Adolescence to Adulthood.
Youth & Society (41)4, 475-502.
9	 Ghandnoosh, N. (2015). Black Lives Matter: Eliminating Racial
Inequity in the Criminal Justice System. The Sentencing Project.
Retrieved from http://www.sentencingproject.org/
publications/black-lives-matter-eliminating-racial-inequity-inthe-criminal-justice-system/
10	 Bersani & Piquero (2016).
11	 (Emphases added) Bersani, B.E. & Piquero, A.R. (September 6,
2016). Immigrants Don’t Commit More Crimes. Why Does the
Myth Persist? Los Angeles Times. Retrieved from http://www.
someaddress.com/full/url/http://www.latimes.com/opinion/
op-ed/la-oe-bersani-piquero-immigrant-crime-20160906-snapstory.html
12	 Sampson R.J., Morenoff J. & Raudenbush S.W. (2005). Social
Anatomy of Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Violence. American
Journal of Public Health (95)2, 224-232.
13	 Bersani B.E. (2014). An Examination of First and Second
Generation Immigrant Offending Trajectories. Justice Quarterly
(31)2, 315–343. Also featured in Morin, R. (October 15, 2013).
Crime Rises Among Second-Generation Immigrants as They
Assimilate. Pew Research Center. Retrieved from http://www.
pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/10/15/crime-rises-amongsecond-generation-immigrants-as-they-assimilate/
14	 Kubrin, C.E. (2014). Secure or Insecure Communities? Seven
Reasons to Abandon the Secure Communities Program.
Criminology & Public Policy (13)2, 323-338; United States
Government Accountability Office (March 2011). Criminal
Alien Statistics: Information on Incarcerations, Arrests, and
Costs. United States Government Accountability Office.
Retrieved from http://www.gao.gov/assets/320/316959.pdf

15	 Hickman, L.J. & Suttorp M.J. (2008). Are Deportable Aliens a
Unique Threat to Public Safety? Comparing the Recidivism of
Deportable and Nondeportable Aliens. Criminology and Public
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16	 Fox, A.M., Katz, C.M. & White, M.D. (2010). Assessing the
Relationship between Immigration Status and Drug Use. Justice
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17	 Ewing, Martinez & Rumbaut (2015).
18	 Brown, A. & Stepler, R. (2016). Statistical Portrait of the
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19	 Brown & Stepler (2016).
20	 Adelman, R., Reid, L.W., Markle, G., Weiss, S. & Jaret, C. (2017).
Urban Crime Rates and the Changing Face of Immigration:
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23	 Ewing, Martinez & Rumbaut (2015).
24	 Castañeda, E. & Heyman, J.M. (2012). Is the Southwestern
Border Really Unsafe? Scholars Strategy Network. Retrieved
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southwestern-border-really-unsafe
25	 Sampson, Morenoff, & Raudenbush. (2005).
26	 Lee, M.T., Martínez, Jr., R. & Rosenfeld, R.B. (2001). Does
Immigration Increase Homicide? Negative Evidence from
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27	 Ousey, G.C. & Kubrin, C.E. (2009). Exploring the Connection
between Immigration and Violent Crime Rates in U.S. Cities,
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28	 Lyons, C.J., Vélez, M.B. & W.A. Santoro (2013). Neighborhood
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29	 Piquero, A.R., Bersani, B.E., Loughran, T.A. & Fagan, J. (2016).
Longitudinal Patterns of Legal Socialization in First-Generation
Immigrants, Second-Generation Immigrants, and Native-Born
Serious Youthful Offenders. Crime & Delinquency (62)11,
1403-1425.
30	 Kubrin, C.E. & Ishizawa, H. (2012). Why Some Immigrant
Neighborhoods are Safer than Others: Divergent Findings from
Los Angeles and Chicago. The Annals of the American Academy of
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31	 Portes, A. & Zhou, M. 1993. (1993). The New Second
Generation. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social
Science 530:74–96.
32	 Martinez R. Jr. (2002). Latino Homicide: Immigration, Violence and
Community. New York: Routledge Press.
33	 Ingraham, C. (January, 2017). Trump says sanctuary cities are
hotbeds of crime. Data say the opposite. The Washington Post.
Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/
wonk/wp/2017/01/27/trump-says-sanctuary-cities-arehotbeds-of-crime-data-say-the-opposite/?utm_
term=.5ca5e65896e9.
34	 U.S. House of Representatives. (1996). Communication
Between Government Agencies and Immigration and
Naturalizations Service. Public Law 104-208, Sec. 642. Retrieved
from http://uscode.house.gov/statviewer.
htm?volume=110&page=3009-707#. On the limitations of
sanctuary city status, see Denvir, D. (February 17, 2017). The
False Promise of Sanctuary Cities. Slate. Retrieved from http://
www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/
jurisprudence/2017/02/the_false_promise_of_sanctuary_cities.
html.
Immigration and Public Safety 15

35	 Taxin, A. (July, 2015). Some ‘sanctuary cities’ want to actively
protect immigrants, others just fearlawsuits. U.S. News and World
Report. Retrieved from http://www.usnews.com/news/us/
articles/2015/07/24/some-sanctuary-cities-fear-lawsuits
36	 Lee, M.Y.H. (February, 2017). Trump claims that ‘sanctuary
cities’ breed crime. The Washington Post. Retrieved from https://
www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/
wp/2017/02/08/trumps-claim-that-sanctuary-cities-breedcrime/?hpid=hp_rhp-top-table-main_trumphearing1230pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.31b454e54a0d
37	 The Politics of Refuge: Sanctuary Cities, Crime, and
Undocumented Immigration. (August 2016). Collingwood
Research. Retrieved from: http://www.collingwoodresearch.
com/uploads/8/3/6/0/8360930/shelter_nopols_blind.pdf
38	 Wong, T.K. (January, 2017). The Effects of Sanctuary Policies
on Crime and the Economy. Center for American Progress.
Retrieved from: https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/
immigration/reports/2017/01/26/297366/the-effects-ofsanctuary-policies-on-crime-and-the-economy/
39	 Theodore, N. (2013). Insecure Communities: Latino Perception
of Police Involvement in Immigration Enforcement. University
of Illinois at Chicago: Department of Urban Planning and
Policy. Retrieved from http://www.policylink.org/sites/default/
files/INSECURE_COMMUNITIES_REPORT_FINAL.PDF
40	 Kirk, D., Papachristos, A., Fagan, J, & Tyler, T. (2012). The
Paradox of Law Enforcement in Immigrant Communities:
Does Tough Immigration Enforcement Undermine Public
Safety? Annals of AAPSS, Volume 641.
41	 Cave, D. & Heisler, T. (June, 2014). Day 20: The Politics of
Crime and Immigration. New York Times, Series The Way North.
Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/
us/the-way-north.html?_r=3#p/20
42	 Chang, C., Mather, K., Santa Cruz, N. (January, 2017). ‘I’m not
going to do it.’ Police aren’t eager to help Trump enforce
immigration laws. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved from: http://
www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-trump-immigrationcops-20170130-story.html
43	 Ferrell, C.E., Baca, L.D., Brattan, W. J., Bully-Cummings, E.M.,
Kelly, R.W., Kerlikowske, G., Miranda, R., Parker, R., & Wiles,
R.D. (June 2006). M.C.C. Immigration Committee
Recommendations for Enforcement of Immigration Laws by
Local Police Agencies. Major Cities Chiefs (M.C.C.). Retrieved
from https://www.majorcitieschiefs.com/pdf/news/MCC_
Position_Statement.pdf. The M.C.C. reiterated this view in a
2013 Position Paper, Immigration Policy, Retrieved from
https://www.majorcitieschiefs.com/pdf/news/2013_
immigration_policy.pdf
44	 Enforcing Immigration Law: The Role of State, Tribal, and
Local Law Enforcement. International Association of Chiefs of
Police. (2005). Retrieved from http://www.theiacp.org/
portals/0/pdfs/publications/immigrationenforcementconf.pdf
45	 Ellement, J.R. (January, 2017). Police ‘Need to Build Trust’ with
Immigrant Community, Evans Says. The Boston Globe. Retrieved
from https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/01/31/
evans-says-boston-police-won-enforce-federal-warrants-someundocumented-immigrants/1vN8Sncjm683kiXISYVfuJ/story.
html; Fausset, R. (November, 2015). Immigration Sanctuary
Ban Creates Uncertainty in North Carolina. New York Times.
Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/15/us/
immigration-sanctuary-ban-creates-uncertainty-in-northcarolina.html?_r=0; Cave, D. & Heisler, T. (June, 2014).
46	 Stowell, J.I., Messner, S.F., Barton, M.S., & Raffalovich, L.E.
(2013). Addition by Subtraction? A Longitudinal Analysis of the
Impact of Deportation Effects on Violent Crime. Law and
Society Review, Volume 47, Issue 4.
47	 Page 933.
48	 Koper, C.S., Guterbock T.M., Woods, D.C., Taylor, B., & Carter,
T.J. (2013). The Effects of Local Immigration Enforcement on
Crime and Disorder: A Case Study of Prince William County,
Virginia. Criminology and Public Policy, Volume 12, Issue 2.
16 The Sentencing Project

49	 This figure is computed using state prison data from the Bureau
of Justice Statistics and using federal prison data from the
Federal Bureau of Prisons. States that did not report these data
(Alaska, California, Nevada, and Oregon) were omitted from
both the numerator and denominator. Carson, E.A. &
Anderson, E. (2016). Prisoners in 2015. United States
Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics. Retrieved
from https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/p15.pdf; Federal
Bureau of Prisons. (January, 2017). Inmate Citizenship.
Retrieved from https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/
statistics_inmate_citizenship.jsp;
United States Census Bureau. American Fact Finder. Retrieved
from https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/nav/jsf/pages/index.
xhtml
50	 Carson & Anderson (2016).
51	 See note 49 on method of calculation. Carson & Anderson
(2016).
52	 Federal Bureau of Prisons. (February 2017). Statistics. Retrieved
from https://www.bop.gov/about/statistics/population_
statistics.jsp
53	 These individuals were not convicted of any crime that carried a
sentence longer than for the immigration law violation. The
non-citizen prison population in the Bureau of Prisons is
distinct from the population held in detention facilities run by
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, U.S. Immigration
and Customs Enforcement, and U.S. Customs and Border
Protection. Also note that more generally, non-citizens are also
more likely than citizens to receive prison sentences and to
receive longer sentences. Light, M.T., Massoglia, M. & King,
R.D. (2014). Citizenship and Punishment: The Salience of
National Membership in U.S. Criminal Courts. SAGE Journals,
Volume 79, Issue 5.
54	 The federal figure includes Class A misdemeanor cases. United
States Sentencing Commission (2015). 2015 Sourcebook of
Federal Sentencing Statistics. Table 9: Citizenship of Offenders
in Each Primary Offense Category. Retrieved from http://www.
ussc.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/research-and-publications/
annual-reports-and-sourcebooks/2015/Table09.pdf;
Rosenmerkel, S., Durose, M., & Dr. Farole, Jr. D., (December,
2009). Felony Sentences in State Courts, 2006 – Statistical
Tables. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Retrieved from https://
www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/fssc06st.pdf
55	 United States Sentencing Commission (2015); United States
Sentencing Commission (2000). 2000 Sourcebook of Federal
Sentencing Statistics. Table 9: Citizenship of Offenders in Each
Primary Offense Category. Retrieved from http://www.ussc.
gov/sites/default/files/pdf/research-and-publications/
annual-reports-and-sourcebooks/2000/table-9_0.pdf
56	 Schmitt, G.R. & Jones, E. (2016). Overview of Federal Criminal
Cases Fiscal Year 2015. United States Sentencing Commission.
Page 9. Retrieved from http://www.ussc.gov/sites/default/
files/pdf/research-and-publications/researchpublications/2016/FY15_Overview_Federal_Criminal_Cases.
pdf
57	 United States Sentencing Commission (2015).
58	 United States House of Representatives (2017-2018). S.45 –
Stop Illegal Reentry Act. Retrieved from https://www.congress.
gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/45?q=%7B%22search%22
%3A%5B%22S.+45%22%5D%7D&r=1; Trump, D.J. (2016).
Donald Trump’s Contract with the American Voter, 100 Day
Plan. Retrieved from https://assets.donaldjtrump.com/_
landings/contract/O-TRU-102316-Contractv02.pdf
59	 United States Sentencing Commission (2015).
60	 United States Sentencing Commission (2015). 2015 Sourcebook
of Federal Sentencing Statistics. Table 9X: Citizenship of
Offenders in Each Primary Offense Category. Retrieved from
http://isb.ussc.gov
61	 Heisig, E. (February, 2017). “Cleveland Federal Judge Says
Mexican Border Crossers He Sentenced were Not Violent
Criminals.” Cleveland.com. Retrieved from http://www.cleveland.
com/court-justice/index.ssf/2017/02/cleveland_federal_
judge_says_m.html

Immigration and Public Safety
Nazgol Ghandnoosh, Ph.D. and Josh Rovner
March 2017

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Race and Punishement: Racial Perceptions of Crime and Support for
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