Since an immigrant who was reported to be undocumented was charged in the murder of an Iowa college student, conservatives have seized on the crime as proof of a need for more stringent immigration policies. "You saw what happened to that incredible, beautiful woman [Mollie Tibbetts]," President Donald Trump said at a West Virginia rally on Tuesday. "Should have never happened ... the immigration laws are such a disgrace. We're getting them changed."
Tibbetts, a 20-year-old student at the University of Iowa, was abducted and murdered in July. On Tuesday, law enforcement officials arrested the suspected killer, Cristhian Rivera, who they said was in the country illegally with a stolen identification card, investigators told the Washington Post. (Rivera's lawyer on Wednesday said that he was in the United States legally, according to the Des Moines Register.)
But social science research shows Rivera is an anomaly: Overwhelmingly, studies prove that immigration does not lead to higher crime rates; if anything, it may actually reduce them. Here are some of the studies informing this consensus:
[For more on this story by EMILY MOON, go to https://psmag.com/social-justi...o-higher-crime-rates]
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