From “immigrant” to “illegal”: Contrary to populist rhetoric, newcomers still commit crimes at a lower rate than native-born citizens

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In September 2017, Honduran Mabel González fled to the United States to escape threats from a local criminal gang. She arrived with her two sons, aged 13 and 15. González crossed the U.S. border through the New Mexico desert and immediately turned herself in to border authorities in order to officially apply for asylum under U.S. law. She and her children were promised placement in a migrant detention center. However, the next evening, González was taken into custody and separated from her sons.

At that time, border states had already begun testing a “zero-tolerance” policy — nine months before Donald Trump officially announced it. Under these new procedures , people who crossed the border were first charged with illegal entry, and only after their case was processed were they allowed to apply for asylum. In May 2018, a court rejected González’s petition, and that summer she was deported from the United States — without her children, who were sent to live with American relatives.

In 2025, an attempt to seek asylum in the United States ended in prison back home for 34-year-old Russian activist Leonid Melekhin. In July he was deported to Russia, where he was taken straight from the airport to a pretrial detention center in Perm. Melekhin had spent nearly ten months in a U.S. migrant detention facility awaiting the review of his asylum application, only to be denied. In Russia, he was charged with “justifying terrorism” over a post on his Telegram channel.

Such stories are becoming increasingly common — not only in the United States, but around the world. According to the United Nations, the number of displaced people has reached 123 million — twice as many as during the Second World War. Meanwhile, right-wing politicians in the U.S. and Europe continue to label migrants as “criminals” or “illegals,” describing their arrival as an “invasion.”

The invention of illegality

The very concept of “illegal immigration” emerged just over a century ago. Historian Mae Ngai, in her book Impossible Subjects: Illegal Aliens and the Making of Modern America, notes that the term began to see widespread use in the United States in the 1920s following the introduction of immigration quotas. Before that, restrictions on migration were minimal and largely just limited newcomers’ rights to vote and participate in formal political life. But alongside quotas came new “categories of exclusion” — factors that could serve as grounds for denying entry. Immigration from Asia was completely banned, while access for Eastern Europeans, especially Catholics and Jews, was severely restricted.

With the introduction of quotas, the share of foreign-born residents in the U.S. population began a decades-long downward trend. In 1920, immigrants made up 13.2% of the country’s residents; by the 1970s, that figure had dropped to 4.7%.

Undocumented migrants do not cause crime to rise

The terms “illegal” and “outsider” dehumanize migrants, framing them as a threat rather than as rights-bearing individuals, notes linguist Teun van Dijk. Sociologists René Flores and Ariela Schachter have found that the label “illegal” also carries racial prejudice: people tend to associate it with non-white and poor migrants, regardless of their actual legal status. At the same time, white foreigners are far more often described by the media and society with the positively shaded term “expat.”

Anti-immigrant sentiment typically grows during periods of inflation and at times when living standards are on the decline, as populist politicians exploit such situations by offering up a convenient scapegoat. Trump, for example, borrowing rhetoric reminiscent of the Third Reich, has claimed that foreigners are “parasites” who “poison the nation’s blood” — and even devour the household pets of hardworking Ohioans. In Italy, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has compared African and Arab immigrants to hordes of orcs from The Lord of the Rings. Her government has declared “emergency measures to stop mass illegal immigration,” promising that these policy changes would supposedly help in the “war on traffickers.” In the United Kingdom, the potential mass deportation of asylum seekers is a topic under discussion.

The far right blames migration for rising crime, yet actual statistics do not support this claim.

This applies to undocumented immigrants as well. According to research by the National Institute of Justice under the U.S. Department of Justice, the average undocumented immigrant commits crimes less often than the average citizen. In fact, they are even more law-abiding than “legal immigrants”: per 100,000 people, undocumented immigrants account for 400 arrests, compared with 800 among other immigrants and more than 1,000 among full citizens. These findings have been confirmed repeatedly by other studies, which also show no correlation between overall crime rates and the pace of undocumented immigration.

Nevertheless, the electorate of right-wing parties tends to trust their emotions more than they do statistics. According to Pew Research, 87% of Trump supporters see undocumented immigration as a “serious threat,” compared with only 27% of Democrats. The situation in Europe is not much different: 67% of respondents significantly overestimate the number of immigrants in their country, and about 24% view migration as the European Union’s main problem. Even in Russia, where anti-immigrant sentiments are comparable, migrants commit crimes at half the rate of native residents.

The image of criminals

While the sorts of far-right radicals who reject migrants of any kind remain a small minority, undocumented migration still provokes widespread indignation in many societies. After all, “illegal” means “against the law.” But what does the term “illegal migrant” really mean?

“Illegal immigration” is a vague concept. Not every unauthorized border crossing is a crime: in the case of refugees, it is fully legal, and in many other cases it is considered an administrative rather than a criminal offense. Human rights advocates do not support “open borders,” but rather a sensible policy approach that takes the full circumstances of a potential immigrant’s arrival into account.

Populist governments, however, blur this distinction by staging what sociologist and anthropologist Nicholas De Genova calls a “border spectacle,” made up of searches, detentions, deportations, and other actions by immigration services. This demonstration of force effectively transforms violations of immigration law — most of which are administrative offences punishable by fines rather than imprisonment — into quasi-criminal cases, leading to far harsher treatment of the “accused.” Migrants are detained, beaten, and surveilled as though they were dangerous criminals.

Laws that treat undocumented migrants as criminals or national security threats ultimately shape public opinion, and in 2006, a new field of legal scholarship emerged to describe these processes: “crimmigration.”

What international law declares

Even as public policy drifts further from the principles agreed upon after the Second World War, international law remains unequivocal: every person has the right to seek protection from persecution.

Legal scholars emphasize that the act of simply crossing a border should not be grounds for punishment. The contemporary asylum system, based on the 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, lays out clear legal pathways for those fleeing persecution to find safe haven. As the United Nations has repeatedly clarified, people are entitled to request protection regardless of how they arrive at a country’s border — whether they come with visas, documents, and permits, or without. The core principles set out in Article 31 of the Convention forbid sending individuals back to territories where their life or freedom would be at risk.

The Refugee Convention did not emerge by chance. It ensures the enforcement of Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights:

“Everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum from persecution.”

After all, one of the main reasons for enshrining both Article 14 and the Convention itself was the utter failure of the international community to protect Jews and other victims of the Holocaust.

Stigmatization and its consequences

The line between “legal” and “illegal” is often drawn arbitrarily, case by case. For example, the Rohingya — Muslims who have lived in Myanmar for centuries — are denied citizenship and stripped in practice even of the right to self-identification. They are forbidden to use the word “Rohingya” and are instead called Bengalis or, of course, “illegal immigrants.”

Holders of temporary protection in the United States — such as refugees from Venezuela or Afghanistan — became “illegals” when Trump revoked their status, despite their years of lawful residence in the country. And a full 42% of so-called “illegal migrants” in the U.S. entered legally but overstayed their visas – often through no fault of their own. Crackdowns on migrants routinely lead to violations of basic human rights. In 2018, when the Trump administration introduced its “zero tolerance” policy, more than 5,000 children were separated from their parents.

Refugees caught in the system of crimmigration find themselves trapped between the formal observance of international law and the actual application of criminal law. In the United States, ICE set records for detentions of “illegals” — who in practice are often asylum seekers. Meanwhile the administration justifies the immigration raids and family separations by claiming that all “illegals” are supposedly dangerous criminals.

Experts in the European Union are sounding the alarm as well. The xenophobic rhetoric of far-right politicians only fuels largely unfounded fears about immigrants. As a result, people seeking safety are punished with measures typically reserved for violent lawbreakers.

As one report by the Council of Europe notes, applying criminal law to migration policy leads to violations of human rights and EU ban on discrimination based on nationality. Yet many European politicians ignore these warnings, continuing to equate “illegals” with criminals.

The consequences of stigmatizing “outsiders” extend far beyond legal practice. Fear has become a natural, almost inescapable condition in migrant communities, observes Carlos Aguilar, a Harvard Graduate School of Education researcher who lived in the United States for 13 years without papers.

Psychological studies confirm this: about one-third of immigrants surveyed in Europe experience constant stress. Fear persists regardless of a person’s legal status and affects entire groups, including even “full” citizens.

On a global scale, today’s anti-immigration practices threaten to undermine the entire refugee protection system. Border enforcement is tightening — from U.S. Navy patrols to the activities of the Libyan coast guard — forcing asylum seekers to take ever more life-threatening routes.

This dehumanization fuels prejudice and violence in societies that practice it. The British human rights organization Hope not Hate found that every inflammatory statement about immigrants made by government officials led to a surge of xenophobic rhetoric on social media. Another study shows that within the prevailing discourse, migrants have come to be seen as “enemies.” These effects weaken social bonds and foster an atmosphere of fear. Out of concern about being detained, migrants are less likely to contact the police, making them easier targets for criminals.

What is to be done?

Migration scholars recommend abandoning stigmatizing expressions. A “migrant” is simply a person. Many historical migrants (for example, European refugees during the Second World War) would, under today’s strict standards, have been labeled “illegals.” At the same time, more humane language fosters more humane relationships. Studies show that people are more willing to help someone described as a “refugee” than as an “illegal migrant.”

Some media outlets are already adopting these recommendations. Several news agencies — including AP and The Guardian — now advise against using the word “illegal” to describe refugees in their updated style guides.

Changing the discourse alone is not enough, though it is an important step. However, to bring modern migration policy into line with international law, measures should be taken to abolish criminal penalties for border crossing (as Canada has done), end the practice of indefinite detention of asylum seekers, and ensure timely, impartial review of asylum applications.