I have read much about immigration issues throughout the last year: President Obama’s policy for illegal immigrants brought to the U.S. as children, the amount of crimes immigrants commit, corrupt politicians (Sherriff Arpaio) and the way they handle immigrants and numerous other issues brought forth by both sides of the debate. To tell you the truth, I’m sick and tired of all the political swill, and the haggling (is that the right word?). It’s an important issue that does need addressing; although sometimes it’s hard to know exactly what to do about it.
In one of the multitude of articles I read, the author discussed crimes committed by both legal and illegal immigrants. Anyway, that’s what I took away from it. The article starts out with: “President Barack Obama‘s decision not to deport some arrested illegal immigrants has enabled a crime wave — but no American or immigrant victims have been publicly identified, and GOP politicians have mostly remained mute.” The statement about a “crime wave” seems a little dramatic. Honestly, if a comparison were done with the crime statistics, I don’t think that one would find that immigrants commit more crimes than other U.S. citizens.
Here are the crime statistics: “Illegal aliens who have been released from custody between 2008 and mid-2011 have been charged with 16,226 subsequent crimes, including 19 murders, 142 sex crimes and thousands of drunk-driving offenses, drug-crimes and felonies, according to a new report from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service.” Mind you, I’m not calling into question the numbers, but there is no comparison in the article as to the numbers of crimes committed by immigrants before these new immigration policies.
The article also discusses the Obama Administration’s actions with regards to the new immigration policies and how it seems to be a move to gain more support among Hispanic voters. Clearly, the large Hispanic population in this country makes it an important population to address.
I will say one thing; every time either side brings up an immigration issue or argument for or against the new policies on immigration, neither side is willing to give credibility, nor listen to what the other has to say. I do think that Obama’s policy for illegal immigrants brought here as children is a dramatic change with respect to immigration in this country. But, it hasn’t created the ripple I would have expected, unless I’m simply not listening to the right people.
I would once like to read an article less one-sided, written to be more receptive to the issues posed by both sides of the debate; not one that simply throws in a bunch of numbers relating to only one group and doesn’t do any kind of analysis or comparisons. The issues brought forth by the author are very valid and there are a lot more problems and challenges that clearly need to be addressed. What do you think about these statistics? Any thoughts on immigration policies?
Categories: Immigration
