Buck Brief - Guess Who Doesn't Want Real Data on Immigrant Crime

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show
Episode: Buck Brief - Guess Who Doesn't Want Real Data on Immigrant Crime
Date: July 10, 2026
Host: Buck Sexton
Guest: Rafael Mangual (Manhattan Institute)

Episode Overview

This episode centers around the contentious debate about the relationship between immigration and crime in the United States, with a particular focus on New York City. Buck Sexton hosts Rafael Mangual, a criminal justice expert from the Manhattan Institute, to discuss their recent research paper co-authored with former NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton. The episode scrutinizes the lack of reliable data on immigrant crime, the motivations behind cities refusing to collect such data, and the broader implications for public policy and sanctuary city practices. The discussion later pivots to recent developments in New York City policing and criminal justice reform.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Lack of Data on Immigrant Crime (00:34–04:49)

• Data Void: Most U.S. jurisdictions, including New York City, do not collect or share data on the immigration status of criminal offenders.
  • “The vast majority of jurisdictions in the United States don't actually collect data on the immigration status of the people who go through the criminal justice system.” — Rafael Mangual, (01:52)
• Sanctuary Policies: NYPD, the largest police force in the country, is legally barred from asking about an individual’s immigration status.
  • Mangual and Bratton recommend jurisdictions begin systematically gathering and reporting these data.
• Policy Implications: The lack of data leads to a debate based on anecdotes and ideology rather than facts.
  • “Every single public safety issue... the first question we've always asked is, what do the data say? And we've been led by data in terms of making decisions about what kind of enforcement policy to pursue. Immigration is really no different.” — Rafael Mangual, (02:47)

Sanctuary City Policies:

• No Rationale for Blocking ICE: Even in the absence of detailed data, Rafael argues there is little public safety rationale for sanctuary city policies, especially for individuals with active ICE detainers.
  • “There’s really no public safety rationale for keeping that person in the jurisdiction… you minimize the cost to the city… and you also enjoy the public safety benefit associated with the absence of an active offender.” — Rafael Mangual, (03:40)
• Turning over individuals to ICE can reduce the need for disruptive federal enforcement actions.

Why Cities Don’t Want the Data (04:49–05:24)

• Political Motivation: Buck suggests—and Rafael agrees—that Democrat-controlled cities avoid collecting such data to protect a political narrative around immigration.
  • "I don’t think they want to have the data on criminal offenders." — Buck Sexton, (05:10)
  • “They don’t.” — Rafael Mangual, (05:10)
• Implication: The absence of data allows cities to claim immigrants have lower crime rates without having to confront any evidence to the contrary.

Ideology vs. Evidence in the Immigration Debate (05:24–09:26)

• Ideological Entrenchment: The public debate is often driven by pre-commitment to political positions, not a pursuit of truth.
  • “It’s a real shame, right, because you’re not actually doing public policy the right way… you have cities… keeping citizens in the dark as to this really important issue.” — Rafael Mangual, (05:34)
• Nuanced Data Needed: Aggregate data (e.g., Texas) is insufficient, as it fails to account for subgroup differences within immigrant and native-born populations.
  • “Immigrants is an umbrella term… there are some, you know, subsets of the immigrant population that are offending at higher rates than others, but we don't really know that from the aggregate data.” — Rafael Mangual, (06:30)
• Flawed Studies: Cato Institute studies are cited as using insufficient proxies (e.g., comparing incarceration rates instead of crime rates).
  • “Research shows that Somali immigrants actually do commit crime at a higher rate than natives… when you dug deeper, you found that the opposite was true.” — Rafael Mangual, (07:57)
• Refusal to Admit Downsides: Open-borders advocates refuse to acknowledge any negative effects of illegal immigration.
  • “The open borders crowd… they will not admit that there’s a trade off. They will always say… there’s no downside to it whatsoever, which I think gives the game away.” — Buck Sexton, (08:27)
  • “Everything has a downside… I mean, you eat too many carrots and that will make you very, very sick, even though they’re generally healthy.” — Rafael Mangual, (09:26)

The Case for More Comprehensive Data (09:26–10:04)

• Call to Action: Rafael urges policymakers to embrace transparency and data collection.
  • “We collect so much data about so many other things… Why not this one?” — Rafael Mangual, (09:46)

New York City Crime & Policing Policy (11:05–13:02)

• Recent NYC Budget Decisions: Last-minute removal of funding for 580 new NYPD officers, a shift attributed to pressure from progressive groups and allies of Zoran Mamdani, a prominent left-wing city councilman.
  • "580 officers were nixed… this was the result of a pressure campaign that was undertaken by Mamdani’s allies on the left, groups like the NYCLU and Legal Aid Society, you know, the dsa." — Rafael Mangual, (11:21)
• Progressive Agenda: Mamdani campaigned on radical reforms such as defunding and disbanding the NYPD, abolishing the gang database and NYPD Strategic Response Group, and closing Rikers Island.
  • Despite these promises, Mamdani’s first six months in office saw increased NYPD enforcement rather than cutbacks.
• Progressive Criticism: Groups like Legal Aid and NYCLU are challenging Mamdani for not delivering on campaign promises to scale back policing.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Data Collection:

  • “Public policy is supposed to be about getting to the truth, getting to the right answer. And the only way… is having good information upon which to base an informed decision. And data is really at the core of that.” — Rafael Mangual, (05:34)

• On Ideology:

  • “It’s almost an indefensible position. Right. Because everything has a downside… a lot of this debate is sort of being had on pure ideological grounds.” — Rafael Mangual, (09:26)

• On NYC Policing:

  • “The first six months of the Mamdani administration have been characterized by him generally leaving the NYPD alone. So enforcement is up in the subways, on the street.” — Rafael Mangual, (12:17)

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Important Timestamps

• 00:34: Start of substantive discussion; lack of data on immigrant crime.
• 02:47: Recommendation to collect and publish data.
• 03:40: Argument against sanctuary policies.
• 05:10: Political reasons cities avoid data collection.
• 06:30-07:57: Problems with aggregate data and subgroup analysis.
• 08:27-09:26: Ideological inflexibility of open-borders advocates.
• 11:05: Discussion of NYC budget and policing reforms.
• 12:17: Analysis of Mamdani’s administration and impact on NYPD.

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Tone and Language

• Direct, skeptical, and data-centric, with an undercurrent of frustration at ideological rigidity.
• The tone is conversational but pointed, with both host and guest expressing frustration at partisan approaches to public safety.

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This detailed summary covers the main arguments, supporting data, and ideological contention discussed in this episode, providing a comprehensive overview for those who missed the conversation.

Transcript

[Host]

This is an I Heart podcast, guaranteed human.

[Joel Osteen]

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[Host]

What's going on with crime in the Big Apple and elsewhere across the nation? Our friend Rafael Mangual back with us here now. He is of the Manhattan Institute. He's got a couple of very interesting pieces out. One of them has to do with immigration and looking at it in the New York City context, but also what this means for crime, sanctuary policies and all that. I will let him, the expert here on this issue, take this over, tell us about this piece. Data. People always argue over the immigrant offender, meaning criminal offender data, but we don't really have good data, do we?

[Rafael Mangual]

No, we don't. That's really kind of the crux of this piece, which I co authored with former NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton. This was a follow on from a public conversation that we had a couple weeks ago. And the conversation was in the context of a broader conference on immigration. And when it comes to the enforcement debate, you kind of have these two camps, right? You've got the restrictionists, you've got the open borders folks. And it's interesting because the one thing that they seem to argue about more than anything else is the public safety issue, right? Do immigrants does immigration hurt or help public safety? So on the one hand, you have the restriction is pointing to cases like Lake and Riley's, for example, where an illegal immigrant does something terrible. And they say, well, this is sort of proof positive that there's a real public safety component to this debate. And then on the other side, you have these folks like from the Cato and Institute that are constantly citing these data out of Texas to suggest that, you know, well, immigrants actually don't commit crimes at the same rate as natives. In fact, they commit crimes at lower rates. But the truth is that we don't really have very good information because the vast majority of jurisdictions in the United States don't actually collect data on the immigration status of the people who go through the criminal justice system. And in New York City, for example, which is the biggest police department in the country, cops are actually legally barred from even asking about immigration status. So one of the arguments that we make in the piece is like, look, every single public safety issue that people like he and I have tackled over the years, the first question we've always asked is, what do the data say? And we've been led by data in terms of making decisions about what kind of enforcement policy to pursue. And immigration is really no different. So the main recommendation of the piece is that we really ought to be gathering and collecting and reporting publicly more data about the nexus between immigration and crime. But the other point that we wanted to make is even in the absence of those data, there's not really a very strong argument for the kind of radical sanctuary city policies. Freudian slipped there for a sanctuary. Silly. But you know, there's really no excuse for the kinds of policies that jurisdictions like New York and LA and Minneapolis, for example, are imposing. Because, you know, especially when you have somebody who's going through the criminal justice system, right, they've been arrested, they've been charged with a crime. The question is, should they be turned over? The ICE now on the left, you'll have people say, well, no, they shouldn't be turned over because their crime hasn't been adjudicated yet. But you got to understand, when someone's prosecuted, when someone's being prosecuted, they're being charged the jurisdiction, the city's official position as to that person is that they are a criminal offender. That's what the city's going into court to argue. That's what the handcuffs mean. So when that person has a final order of removal or a detainer placed on them by ice, there's really no public safety rationale for keeping that person in the jurisdiction. Right? If you allow ICE to take that case over, not only do you minimize the cost to the city associated with having to prosecute a criminal case to the end, but you also enjoy the public safety benefit associated with the absence of an active offender. But also, if you're someone who cares about these broad based immigration enforcement campaigns, you also reduce the need for the federal government to send agents into your city and do street level immigration enforcement, which they're not really all that well suited for. Right? I mean, this is not the kind of operation that agencies like ICE and CBP were made to undertake. So why not just turn these individuals over in a controlled setting? And so that's kind of the basic argument of that piece.

[Host]

I'm going to tell you something, I'm wondering if you've already Seen some of this coming up in the research. I think municipalities, basically every major city, which are Democrat controlled almost uniformly across the country and are overwhelmingly sanctuary city jurisdictions in some capacity. I don't think they want to have the data on criminal offenders.

[Rafael Mangual]

They don't.

[Host]

I think they don't.

[Joel Osteen]

Right.

[Host]

You've already seen this. Yeah, they don't want to know. They want to tell everybody that illegal aliens commit fewer crimes than the general population of America, but they don't want to actually have the data. What does that tell you?

[Rafael Mangual]

That's exactly right. I mean, I do think that a lot of this is really driven by these ideological pre commitments to one side of this issue. And it's a real shame, Right, because you're not actually, actually doing public policy the right way. Right. Public policy is supposed to be about getting to the truth, getting to the right answer. And the only way that you can get to the right answer, aside from guessing, is having good information upon which to base an informed decision. And data is really at the core of that. So, you know, it's a real shame that you have cities, including, like New York, which are kind of at the vanguard of so many things, you know, keeping citizens in the dark as to this really important issue. And what that leaves us with is a dearth of data on which to have an incomplete debate. Right. So you have people who point to Texas, for example, which is one of the few jurisdictions that does collect data about immigration status of criminal offenders. And yeah, sure, some of that data, you know, can, can be used to show that, you know, immigrants as a whole commit crime at a lower rate than natives as a whole. But what those data don't really tell us is what the different subgroups do. Right. I mean, you know, immigrants, that's a umbrella term that encompasses a very diverse group of individuals who are going to offend at radically different rates. Right. So, you know, one question that that leaves open, for example, is like, well, you know, how often ages 18 and 40 commit crimes who cross the, you know, southern border illegally and are of Hispanic descent versus, say Eastern European men, you know, in the same age group who overstayed visas. Right. Like, you know, it is very possible that there are some, you know, subsets of the immigrant population that are offending at higher rates than others, but we don't really know that from the aggregate data. Same goes for the, for the native data. Right. I mean, you'll see a lot of these advocates, like, you know, they, they compare it to the native data in the aggregate without really understanding that the native crime rate is driven dis. Disproportionately by one subgroup of native Americans, Native born Americans, and that's black men. So it could be, for example, that certain immigrant subgroups are more criminal than most of the native subgroups, except for say, black men. And you know, Somali immigrants is a good example. There was a paper done by Cato that claimed that they committed crimes at a lower rate because they were incarcerated at a lower rate and they were using, you know, an imperfect proxy for criminal incarceration anyway. But you know, the problem with that is that incarceration, incarceration is just a snapshot, right? It's a snapshot in time. It doesn't, you know, in, at one moment, right. Somali immigrants may be incarcerated at a lower rate than native born Americans, but because they're here for less time and because incarceration is largely a function of recidivism. Right. Very few people go to prison after their first offense. You have to adjust for that. And actually when you do, research shows that Somali immigrants actually do commit crime at a higher rate than natives. Right. So there's one example where, you know, the, the data that we did was sort of used to give us an incomplete picture. And then when you dug deeper, you found that the opposite was true. Right. So I just think that when it comes to public discourse about complex issues, more information is always better than less.

[Host]

I remember a long time ago having a debate with someone from Cato. It's probably the same person you're talking about and I thought it was interesting. I couldn't get him to admit that there was any downside to illegal immigration at all. Which I think just goes to the, this is an ideological, it's like a religious belief. Illegal immigration is good for America. We'll find a way. This is how CATO operates, by the way. We'll find a way to explain to everybody how there's no, it's not. So I wasn't even saying. Which by the way, I, I, with whatever good stuff people want to say from, comes from illegal immigration. I still think there's a lot of worse stuff that comes from it. So that's my perspective. But I was just saying, will you admit there's anything bad and the, and the, the non restrictionist or whatever people want to call them. The open borders crowd is what I would call them. They will not admit that there's any, they won't admit that there's a trade off. They will always say it's not it. It grows the economy, American dream. It's great. They offended a lower rate. There's no downside to it whatsoever, which I think, I think that gives the game away.

[Rafael Mangual]

I think that's absolutely right. I mean, it's, it's, it's almost an indefensible position. Right. Because everything has a downside. Of course there isn't. You know, you eat too many carrots and. Right. That will make you very, very sick, even though they're generally healthy. So now I think you're exactly right. I think a lot of this debate is sort of being had on pure ideological grounds. And I'm hoping that, you know, our piece will break through and that jurisdictions will start collecting more information. Right. I mean, the question I have for them is what are you afraid of? Right. I mean, why not? You know, we collect so much data about so many other things. We, you know, allow for the idea that data should guide us in every other realm of public policy. Why not this one?

[Host]

Let's talk in a second about your other piece which is out today, which you can tell everybody about on crime in New York City and specifically Mamdani Kami Mamdani, who's getting more attention as a Democrat, I think, than anyone else. That's what I call him. Yeah, well, that's what Trump calls him too. So there you go.

[Rafael Mangual]

It has a good ring to it.

[Host]

Thank you. Thank you. We'll come, we'll come back here in a second to that. But our sponsor here is Super Sure. Your business needs insurance year round. You need super sure for your business insurance. If your company has more than 25 employees, whether you're the owner, CFO or HR manager can be too complex to just buy a policy online. Super sure is the super agency built for you, licensed at every state for your business, insurance and employee benefits, all with year round support for you and your team. Go to super sure.com buck one super agency, one powerful platform. All your policies in one place. Super sure.com buck that's super sure.com buck paid for by Super Sure Insurance Agency LLC, a licensed insurance agency. All right, Rafael, piece number two, what's going on? NYC?

[Rafael Mangual]

Yeah, I mean it's last week, you know, the, the New York City budget was finally agreed upon. And what was interesting is in the lead up to the budget being finalized, there was a budget line for the hiring of 580 additional NYPD officers. So basically a new academy class. And then at the very last minute that academy class disappeared from the budget. That was finally approved. So 580 officers were nixed. This was the result of a pressure campaign that was undertaken by Mamdani's allies on the left, groups like the NYCLU and Legal Aid Society, you know, the dsa, they have been pushing him really, really hard on this. And in their minds, right, any policing is bad, right? So certainly we don't want to hire more cops. This is the first time that Zora Mamdani has actually cracked under that pressure. And it's a really bad sign. I. Because if you think about the promises that he made as a candidate, they were very frightening. I mean, this is a guy who had to moderate from an insanely low bar, which was wanting to defund and disband the NYPD completely after the murder of Dideroul Islam. Started to kind of distance himself from his prior rhetoric on the nypd, but still wrote into office after having made promises to abolish the gang database, to get rid of the srg, the Strategic Response Group of the nypd, to take the commissioner's authority to discipline her office and give it to the Civilian Complaint Review Board to close rikers, to replace the NYPD on mental Health response with the Department of Community Safety. None of those things, interestingly enough, have happened in the first six months of the Mamdani administration. The first six months of the Mamdani administration have been characterized by him generally leaving the NYPD alone. So enforcement is up in the subways, on the street. And it's been really interesting because you have some groups like Legal Aid and the NYCLU who have been hitting Mamdani over the last couple months, saying, like, hey, you promised that you were gonn. You know, scale the NYPD back. And they're doing more and more enforcement.

[Joel Osteen]

The Joel Osteen Daily Podcast. God's plans for you are for good. Be inspired. Get ready. God is about to exceed your expectations. Joel Osteen Daily Podcast. You are coming out of that dry place into more than enough daily encouragement right when you need it. There are opportunities in your future bigger than you can imagine. Listen to the Joel Osteen Daily podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your favorite podcasts.