Donald Trump has never minced his words about immigrants. He calls them “migrant criminals,” “illegal monsters,” “killers,” and “gang members.” He says they’re “poisoning our country” and destroying the “blood of our nation.”
So I won’t mince words about his mass deportation strategy: it’s reckless, cruel, and making all of us less safe.
No matter how much President Trump claims this is about public safety, I can tell you from my decades working in city government and in a prosecutor’s office that what the administration is doing is directly undermining the ability of law enforcement to keep our communities safe.
When I was in a district attorney’s office, we relied on community members to testify in court and provide information that helped us solve cases and prosecute violent individuals. When people fear that cooperating with law enforcement could lead them or their loved ones to be deported, they are less likely to come forward when they are the victim of or witness to a crime. That makes it harder to investigate, solve, and prosecute crime.
In Trump’s America, kids are scared to go to school and come home to find their mom or dad gone. Local elected officials are being threatened with prosecution if they refuse to cooperate with Trump’s inhumane immigration orders. U.S. citizens, veterans, and people in the country legally are being detained in poorly planned and executed raids. Pregnant women and children have been among the first deportations, hardly the violent criminals Trump said he was prioritizing.
This isn’t just about policy for me; it’s personal. I immigrated to the United States from Guatemala as a child and am a naturalized citizen. So I know that if we want safer communities, local law enforcement must prioritize building relationships with immigrant communities.
Yet, Trump’s directives rely on co-opting police and prosecutors into immigration enforcers, which will divert limited time, resources, and attention from real public safety issues. We need law enforcement focused on investigating and solving serious crimes, not rounding up members of our community while they’re at work, school, and church.
Immigration is consistently associated with decreases in violent and property crime. Less than 10 percent of undocumented immigrants in the United States have a criminal record – and the small percentage who do are most commonly for traffic violations or civil immigration violations. That’s far less than the American population, where nearly 40 percent have criminal records.
If Trump cared about public safety, he would invest in the comprehensive reforms our immigration system needs. Instead, as immigration arrests and deportations escalate, it will destabilize not only individual families but our society as a whole, with devastating consequences.
More than 5 million children could be separated from a family member who is undocumented. Where will they live? Will they remain in school? Who will pay to clothe and feed these children?
Economists say mass deportations will lead to higher costs, higher unemployment, less tax revenue, and lower wages. Farming, construction, and hospitality will face the most acute worker shortages. All at a cost of nearly $1 trillion over the next decade. That’s taxpayer money that could be spent on community investments that prevent crime and promote public safety.
As we saw during the COVID pandemic, when the stability of communities is disrupted, crime rates go up and it becomes harder to keep communities safe. Mass deportations would similarly destabilize communities and our economic system in ways that will have devastating effects on public safety.
It’s for all these reasons that California passed SB 54 in 2017. While the Trump administration has spread rampant misinformation about these types of sanctuary laws, research has found no impact of sanctuary policies on crime rates, and nothing in SB 54 prevents law enforcement from cooperating with federal immigration authorities when non-citizens commit serious felonies. In fact, between 2018 and 2023, California jails transferred more than 4,000 individuals to immigration authorities.
What SB 54 does is limit how local law enforcement can be deputized to act as immigration enforcers. This allows them to remain focused on investigating and solving crime. And if non-citizens commit violence and cause harm to our communities, they will be held accountable just as a citizen would be.
We should be proud of our state for enacting SB 54 and ensuring that our law enforcement resources are focused on public safety, not immigration enforcement. Prosecutors, police, and sheriffs across California must not be intimidated by Trump’s threats or get distracted by the outrageous and inhumane rhetoric coming from Washington, DC. They should stay focused on their mission and the strategies we know will keep Californians safe.
When we protect our immigrant communities, we protect all of us.
Cristine Soto DeBerry is the executive director of Prosecutors Alliance Action.