As a percentage, crime by illegals versus US born

1. The short numeric answer: undocumented offending often well below native-born levels

State-level and focused analyses give the clearest percentage comparisons: Texas, the only state that records criminal arrests and convictions by immigration status, showed immigrants of all legal statuses arrested at less than half the rate of U.S.-born citizens for violent and drug crimes and at roughly one-quarter the rate for property crimes, a striking pattern echoed in MPI’s synthesis ^[1]. Studies focused on incarceration and conviction data likewise report large gaps—one multi‑decade analysis summarized by Northwestern and other outlets finds first‑generation immigrants in recent decades are about 60 percent less likely to be incarcerated than U.S.-born citizens, a different but related measure of serious offending ^[2].

2. National and aggregate research: immigration does not raise crime and often correlates with declines

Broad national analyses and meta‑reviews find either no statistically significant correlation between the immigrant share of the population and total crime rates or a negative correlation, with immigrant growth coinciding with falling violent and property crime in recent decades, as reported by the American Immigration Council and other researchers ^{[4] [5]}. Researchers and policy centers including the Migration Policy Institute and the Brennan Center summarize a weight of evidence that immigrants, including undocumented migrants, do not increase violent crime and often have lower contact with the criminal justice system than the U.S.-born ^{[1] [3]}.

3. Why percentages differ by study: measures, geography, and definitions matter

Differences between arrest rates, conviction rates, incarceration rates and self‑reported offending produce varying percentage gaps across studies; Texas’s administrative arrest and conviction records offer one reliable within‑state benchmark, while national work often relies on incarceration or survey proxies because immigration status is rarely recorded in federal crime datasets ^{[1] [6]}. Official enforcement tallies such as CBP’s “criminal alien” summaries document convictions found in law enforcement databases but use a distinct operational definition and do not provide a simple national per‑capita comparison of undocumented versus native‑born crime rates ^[7].

4. Counterclaims, political framing, and data limitations

Political and media claims sometimes emphasize raw counts of border encounters or enforcement actions—Crime in America and some public officials cite many millions of unauthorized crossings since 2021—which can be framed to imply higher criminal risk but do not by themselves establish per‑capita offending rates or comparative percentages ^[8]. Scholarly summaries and historical analyses caution that measurement issues (policing bias, inclusion of migration offenses, and differences in social context) can complicate direct comparisons; international and historical exceptions also exist and are discussed in encyclopedic and academic reviews ^{[9] [10]}.

5. Conclusion and transparent caveat

Taken together, the best available research in these sources shows immigrants — including those without authorization — commit and are convicted/incarcerated for fewer crimes per capita than U.S.-born people, with representative findings showing undocumented offending and arrest rates often well below half the U.S.-born rate for violent and drug offenses and markedly lower incarceration likelihoods ^{[1] [2] [3]}. However, there is no single, undisputed national percentage that covers every crime category and legal status across all jurisdictions in the sources provided; comparisons depend on the metric chosen (arrests, convictions, incarceration), geographic coverage, and how “illegal” or “undocumented” status is identified ^{[1] [7] [6]}.