Stop it

Article

Trump's warning on illegal immigrants proves grimly prophetic

Summary

Sean Hannity focuses on some recent crimes and his own experience to make a case for Pres. Trump's immigration policy.

Quote

"President Trump is right: We can never forget those whose lives were destroyed by illegal immigrants. And we need to demand a secure border and an end to local policies that allow illegal immigrant criminals to prey on innocent Americans."

Understanding

Hannity cites unattributed statistics to make his case, so I wanted to see what other data might indicate -

1. A NY Times article from March 6, 2017, "Here’s the Reality About Illegal Immigrants in the United States" references Migration Policy Institute estimates that about 300,000 of the 11 million undocumented residents of the United States have committed a felony in the past decade.
2. The FBI's annual report "Crime in the United States" estimates there were 1,197,704 violent crimes committed in 2015
3. In 2015, CNN cited findings from a Mother Jones article that assembled data on mass shootings the U.S. since 1982. The racial profile of the mass shooters was -

• 64% white men
• 16% black men
• 9% Asian men
• 11% Latino, Native American or unknown

About 300,000 felonies in the last decade compared to over a million violent crimes in one year. Nearly two-thirds of the mass shootings in the U.S. by white men versus an indistinguishable amount attributed to Latinos.

Hannity's priority is hard to justify or defend. I can only guess his personal motives but I won't since I don't know him. His public persona has the style of a bully and the conventional wisdom is that bullys are insecure, frustrated and hurt. Some bully because they are copying behavior of people they admire.

That potential for copycat behavior is frightening. Hannity copies Trump. How many will copy Hannity? Empathy is not part of the solution here. This behavior needs to stop.