Immigration, Violent Crime, and the Effect of Enforcement on Communities

• In Event: Immigration and Policing

Abstract

Criminologists have established that immigration is often associated with reductions in violent crime, but it is unclear why this negative relationship exists. Some argue that this relationship is due to the stability that immigrants bring to neighborhoods, both through their commitment to strong nuclear families and in their contributions to communities. Could increases in immigration enforcement threaten this relationship by removing residents and destabilizing the neighborhood? We examine whether such increases in enforcement change the immigration-crime relationship, specifically, whether increases in enforcement are associated with increases in violent crime. We examine this question using data on the Secure Communities program, a national program that involves local police departments in federal immigration enforcement. Using data on metropolitan counties drawn from Immigration and Custom Enforcement’s Interoperability Statistics from 2009 to 2014, the FBI’s Uniform Crime Report from 2008 through 2014, and the 2009 through 2014 waves of the American Community Survey 1-year sample, we investigate whether increases in immigration enforcement are associated with increases in violent crime rates to determine whether stability helps explain the immigration-crime relationship.

Authors

• Emily A. Shrider, The Ohio State University

• Paola Echave, The Ohio State University