Migrant crime grows as campaign issue — but is there an actual spike?

Republicans are pointing to a series of high-profile murders to argue that President Joe Biden is overseeing a wave of migrant crime as data on whether there is a true uptick nationally are hard to come by.

Migrant advocates have long noted that illegal immigrants are less likely to commit crime than U.S. citizens, citing long-standing research on incarceration rates. But the highly covered deaths of several Americans, amplified by Republicans in the run-up to the election, have brought the issue to the forefront of many voters’ minds.