The Center for Immigration Studies Produces Improbably High Estimates of Illegal Immigrant Criminality in Texas

ConclusionRelative to my Cato research, CIS made two data changes to estimate higher illegal immigrant criminal conviction rates in Texas. The first change was to use updated and higher Texas DPS data on criminal convictions of illegal immigrants – changes that I can’t replicate in more recent and up to date Texas DPS data. The second change was to reduce the size of the illegal immigrant population. They chose the second lowest Texas illegal immigrant population estimate published, which contradicts CIS’sown pure population research elsewhere that finds a  much higher illegal immigrant population in Texas and nationwide.In other words, CIS found their new criminal conviction estimates by increasing the number of convictions of illegal immigrants in a  way that doesn’t match the most recent Texas DPS data but thatcould be true and implausibly reducing the population of illegal immigrants below what their own research suggests. They increased the numerator and decreased the denominator to produce a  higher crime rate. Increasing the numerator doesn’t appear to be correct but it’s not an implausible adjustment. Reducing the denominator below CIS’s own estimates of the illegal immigrant population is not plausible. Using CIS’s homicide conviction data and its own pure population estimat es narrows the conviction rate gap between illegal immigrants and native‐​born Americans in Texas, but it does not vanish and it certainly doesn’t show that illegal immi...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs