Letter to the Editor: Trump's misleading stats on immigrant crime

Dear Editor:

Donald Trump thinks that he can make America great again by building “walls” to divide the United States of America and Mexico. Trump’s illogical reasoning is that “they're [undocumented Mexican immigrants] bringing drugs, they're bringing crime, they're rapists.”

Apparently, it’s only Mexicans that the American people should be afraid of because as we all know, there are no Canadian drug dealers, criminals, or rapists.

However, who is really to blame for the drug demand...the Mexicans bringing it in or the Americans that are demanding it?

There have been several Americans who have been notorious for drug trafficking in the United States; including, “Freeway Ricky Ross”, “Nicky Barnes”, and Frank Lucas. Do we build “walls” around them too? And crime? Well, historically, studies show that immigrants are less likely than the “natives” to commit violent crimes.

Let’s start with Adam Lanza, who shot and killed 20 elementary school children in Connecticut. James Holmes, who shot and killed 10 people in a movie theater in Colorado. Both: white Americans. But, according to Trump, white Americans are not dangerous, only people of color. What about the rapists? Whites account for 71% of sexual assaults documented (above their total percentage of 63% of the U.S. population) while Latinos account for 9% of documented sexual assault.

While we eat our Subway sandwiches, Jared Fogle, spokesperson that promoted healthy sandwiches, plead guilty to two federal charges in which he engaged in sexual acts with children, possessed and distributed child pornography. Jared Fogle. White American man. “Non-immigrant.” Let’s not discuss Brock Turner.

Trump stated that there are “tens of thousands” of “violent beatings, rapes, and murders” committed by immigrants. He stated that there were “three million arrests attached to the incarcerated immigrant population.” What he failed to mention in his speech is that the majority of these offenses are traffic crimes and immigration offenses, and only 10% of these crimes are assaults, sex offenses, and homicides. Stating this high number makes it seem as though many immigrants are criminals, when in actuality it is estimated that many of these arrests are by repeat offenders and not committed by the vast majority of the people looking for peaceful refuge in America.

Let’s start discussing these issues without color lines.

What we should build is a “wall” around Trump.

Mayerling Castro, Candice Kirk, Mari Nakayama, Jessica Palacio and Christopher Perdue
The authors of this letter are Masters of Social Work students at Cal State Long Beach.