What is the Cato Institute? “The Cato Institute is a public policy research organization — a think tank — dedicated to the principles of individual liberty, limited government, free markets, and peace. Its scholars and analysts conduct independent, nonpartisan research on a wide range of policy issues.” It is a libertarian think-tank founded by one of the Koch brothers. The Koch brothers range from libertarian to very conservative, and they use their money for political purposes.
Thus, it would be fair and accurate to say that whatever the Cato Institute publishes is going to tend to come from a libertarian to very conservative mindset. The sad part is that I am having to spend two paragraphs explaining this because otherwise, their conclusions would not be accepted by all too many political conservatives. But the main point is that the Cato Institute has done more than one study on the criminality of immigrants, and researched other peer-reviewed studies.
What they found directly contradicts both what President Trump has tweeted about the criminals coming over the border and the fake news claims of most other conservative organizations. I must congratulate the Cato Institute on the careful work that they have done in this area, but more than that, I must congratulate them on an honesty that has not been much seen in the political discussions of the last several years.
Below are three quotes from their website. You are most certainly welcome to go and check out the quotes to ensure that I am not taking them out of context. I hope you will also be willing to believe them, as they have good documentation and references on their site.
All immigrants have a lower criminal incarceration rate and there are lower crime rates in the neighborhoods where they live, according to the near-unanimous findings of the peer-reviewed evidence. Since 1911, large nationwide federal immigration commissions have asked whether immigrants are more crime-prone than native-born Americans and each one of them answered no, even when the rest of their reports unjustifiably blamed immigrants for virtually every problem in the United States. From the 1911 Immigration Commission, also known as the Dillingham Commission, to the 1931 Wickersham Commission, and 1994’s Barbara Jordan Commission, each has reported that immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than native-born Americans. …
Cato scholars have since published numerous Immigration Research and Policy Briefs to shed light on this topic. Michelangelo Landgrave, a doctoral student in political science at the University of California, Riverside, and I released a paper today that estimates that illegal immigrant incarceration rates are about half those of native-born Americans in 2017. …
The Texas research is consistent with the finding that crime along the Mexican border is much lower than in the rest of the country, homicide rates in Mexican states bordering the United States are not correlated with homicide rates here, El Paso’s border fence did not lower crime, Texas criminal conviction rates remain low (but not as low) when recidivism is factored in, and that police clearance rates are not lower in states with many illegal immigrants – which means that they don’t escape conviction by leaving the country after committing crimes.
Agreed, the problem is when someone from another.place comes here illegally, we do not know who they are, so that in itself.puts a cloud over them. We do not know if they have a criminal record, they have not let anyone know, or if they are immunized or if whatever. We are a generous nation and outgive every nation on earth, yet for.some it is never enough. I would agree it is never enough for us as Christian’s, the government is supposed to protect us, as all Presidents have it has only been a hoopla since President Trump has been in office. We Christian’s have a different calling than our Government does. God created nations to protect the people and have organization, not chaos. We Christian’s need to help everyone we can, not checking for citizenship or anything but to show Gods love.
While the studies are retrospective, what they do tell us is that the criminality of the incoming immigrants, even the ones without visas, is actually lower than that of our own citizens. Thus the ginned up fake worry about the incoming immigrants is just that, fake, false, and xenophobic to boot.
Ernesto M. Obregón agreed. But there status is not a fault of any citizen or even our Government. If the 80 percent of those who dont qualify for assilym did not jam up the system by crossing our border illegally and only 2 percent go to court once they have a ruling on status which shows deception, they are not without fault by any means. And if they were not here as they should not be that number would be zero of crimes committed. we could better help the 10 to 20 percent that are in need and qualify for help.
Fake would mean it.does not.exist at all, it.is overstated I agree, I dont agree on the immunization issue. Most are a health risk. And is why we have a orderly process for.coming in to our country. Not by what they want, but by laws and orderly processes passed by elected officials. Every nation has these laws. You and I have traveled and had to respect the laws of other nations. Why is it such a problem now that President Trump is President. I am not a fan. He does some things good and some bad, but President Obama deported many more illegals and he rightly started separating children from adults that were not there parents. Yet where was the outcry? As you know I am not talking about you father. But the generalizations on both sides of this argument.I firmly beleive a man should protect his family, his country not run out on them. I would feel better if it was the elderly and the persecuted coming across our borders, than those that come just for economical gain, which is not a reason to be here at all.
There are two issues being discussed. One is crossing the border without permission. The other is whether those crossing the border expose us to a higher degree of danger. I was answering the second one.
Ernesto M. Obregón I understand.
Father, the problem is that many of the so-called conservatives who follow and support Trump and his utterances believe and insist that much of the Republican Party, among them the Koch brothers and the Cato Institute, are RINOs — Republicans in name only –, co-opted by liberal attitudes and therefore are corrupt enemies of America. They believe nothing Cato publishes, and believe any evidence that contradicts anything Trump says is a hoax perpetrated by the MSM (mainstream media) and the “elites” of both the Republican and Democratic Parties. Good luck talking to them; I’m afraid you’re just shouting into the wind.
A lot of this is common sense too.
Yes, some folks come with dubious intentions, but for the most part, most want a normal life for themselves and their families. if you want to live a normal life in a new country it’s best to follow the laws. Most migrants know that and do that. They do.
Again, yes, there are some intentional drug dealers, thugs, sex traffickers as well as plenty of educated, wealthy non-Latino (‘cause this is about ethnicity too) immigrants that take advantage of every social benefit they can just because they can.
This happens everywhere. No such thing as totally keeping out bad guys and parasites. Not gonna happen.
But Father Ernesto is right, most migrants are much less likely to be intentionally involved in criminal behavior. They want to live normal lives with their loved ones. Robbing banks tends to make that very difficult and highly unlikely!