The Effectiveness of Sanctuary Cities

As the Senate debates the latest amnesty plan, along comes a study that suggests there is a stifling effect from immigration enforcement.  It seems that illegal aliens (and immigrants in general) are less likely to cooperate with local police because they fear investigation and deportation as a result.

The study is a collaboration between PolicyLink and U of I Chicago.  The survey was done by Lake Research Partners.  (You can do your own research about these organizations.  I found them to be far left of center in their projects, leaders and staff.)

You can read the report here:

http://www.policylink.org/atf/cf/%7B97c6d565-bb43-406d-a6d5-eca3bbf35af0%7D/INSECURE_COMMUNITIES_REPORT_FINAL.PDF

Three things struck me about this study:

1)     Sanctuary city policies are NOT having the intended effect.  If they are in place to instill cooperation between police and the foreign-born…THEY AIN’T WORKIN’.  All four of the cities studied are sanctuary cities.  And the surrounding counties in three of the four are also sanctuaries.  Chicago and LA have long-standing sanctuary policies, dating back to 1985 and 1979 respectively.  And yet 40+% of the target population responded that they were not likely to cooperate with police.  Even Sheriff Joe’s Maricopa County (the toughest Sheriff in the nation) scored nearly as well in the areas of reporting crime and cooperation.

2)     Given the lack of willingness to cooperate with police regarding crimes in the community explain to me why we want to grant amnesty to these illegal aliens.

3)     The TIMING of the release of this study seems fishy.  The data was collected in November and December…and it comes out just as the Senate is marking up the Gang of Eight plan.  (I’m not shocked; the client list of Lake Research Partners reads like a Democratic primary ballot.)

I suppose the intended result of this study coming out now is to generate sympathy for the plight of illegal aliens and as a byproduct imply that Obama has been strong on enforcement.  A rational look at the study in context should dismiss it as agenda-driven hype.