UCI Chancellor’s Professor of criminology, law and society Charis E. Kubrin was a guest speaker at the Canyon Democrats general meeting, where she presented Evidence First: What the Data Really Say About Immigration and Crime on July 21.
Club members met inside the Norman P. Murray Community and Senior Center at Mission Viejo. Some sat in round tables scattered throughout the room, while others sat in chairs facing towards the podium. Each member received a piece of paper containing the information about the club and the meeting’s agenda.
The meeting started at 7 p.m. with announcements from board members, including updates of candidates in Mission Viejo regarding their reelections.
Mission Viejo City Council candidate Cynthia Vasquez presented her campaign platform, advocating for community, public service and fiscal responsibility.
Kubrin then began her presentation at 7:30 p.m. She first discussed Robert J. Sampson’s 2006 article, Open Doors Don’t Invite Criminals, which inspired her to pursue research.
“But what got me kind of motivated to do work in this area was the hate mail that he was receiving simply for reporting those findings,” Kubrin told New University in an interview.
Sampson found that higher immigration rates in U.S. cities were associated with lower crime rates. After reading this research, Kubrin hoped to use data to better understand the relation between immigration and crime and combat misinformation.
“I think the importance of data is to inform policy and practice, and right now we’re making a lot of policy and practice around immigration that has nothing to do with what the data say,” Kubrin said.
Kubrin discussed American attitudes and beliefs surrounding the question of whether more immigrants lead to higher crime rates. According to Kubrin’s findings, a majority of Americans feel that immigrants are likely to cause higher crime rates. Kubrin noticed that a majority of other research has consistently demonstrated that the connection between immigration and crime rates does not match public perception.
Kubrin also highlighted immigration as a boost to local economies and a source of strong social networks. Despite many studies that reported these findings, she argued that a large gap remains between what researchers know and what the public perceives to be true.
“We vote on bills based on what we perceive as problems in our state or society,” Kubrin said. “These perceptions that people have, these beliefs that they have have real-world consequences.”
Kubrin was also a speaker to other political party organizations who requested her, wanting California voters to have the necessary information before voting.
Fifth-year psychology and social ecology major Liv Martin is a member of Young Canyon Democrats. She enjoys keeping up with democracy and learning how these policies and laws affect her community.
“I try to tell people my own age about what’s currently going on to transfer as much important information as possible,” Martin told New University.
Martin also considers other factors that affect immigration, including psychological and cultural implications.
“Everyone’s coming from somewhere,” Martin said. “So, being able to see how even today you view immigration so negatively when immigration is the foundation of this country [is] kind of mind-boggling.”
Kubrin also shared her teaching experience at UCI, where she teaches a course titled “Immigration and Crime in the Global Context.” Many students in her class are first-generation students, immigrants or children of immigrants.
“So these issues are not just of interest to them, like in a theoretical sense, but these issues are real to the lives of many of our UCI students,” Kubrin said.
Kubrin concluded her speech by sharing how research can play a significant factor in shifting the narrative of immigrants.
Melody Liao is a Features Intern for the summer 2026 quarter. She can be reached at liaome@uci.edu.
Edited by Aditya Biswas and Geneses Navarro.
